It was the work of only a few seconds for the active lads to get poor Sud from under the cot, and cut the ropes that bound him. Then the bag was taken from his head, and it was discovered that he was gagged. The smell of chloroform was more strong and Jerry, applying to his nose the rag that had served to stifle the voice of the watchman, detected on it the odor of the drug.
“This is desperate business,” remarked Ned soberly.
“Indeed it is,” asserted Jerry. “If Noddy Nixon has had a hand in this I’ll prosecute him for it. He’s going too far. This is the worst of his many tricks.”
“Do you think Sud will die?” inquired Andy, hovering about anxiously, moving here and there, like a restless bird. “Is he dead now? I can’t hear him breathe.”
“Oh, he’ll be all right as soon as we get him into the fresh air,” declared Jerry. “Bob, bring me the aromatic ammonia. I’ll give him a few drops, and then we’ll carry him outside.”
The boys, from long experience in traveling and camping, knew something about simple remedies, and soon a restorative was being forced through Sud’s lips. Then he was carried outside the shed, and his collar loosened. In a few minutes he opened his eyes, and stared wonderingly about him.
“Don’t—don’t hit me again!” he implored. “I ain’t never done nothin’ to you, Mr. Nixon—but I can’t let you take the airship without——” then the unfortunate man stopped, as he saw friendly faces about him.
“Was I—did I dream it?” he asked, passing his hand over his head. “Is the airship all right? Was Noddy Nixon here? Did he hit me?” and he felt of the back of his head.
“The airship is gone,” replied Jerry. “What happened, Sud? Were you attacked? Was Noddy Nixon here in the night?”
“He was, or else I dreamed it,” declared the watchman. “He struck me, too, and then I don’t remember what happened, except I smelled something funny. Then it got dark, and I heard noises—but you say the airship’s gone?”
“Completely,” broke in Bob.
“Then we must get right after Noddy Nixon, and the old man, and Jack Pender, who were with him!” declared Sud excitedly, trying to rise, but falling weakly back.
“Easy now, take it easy,” advised Jerry soothingly. “We’ll get after him, all right. But you must first tell us what happened. Do you feel strong enough?”
“Oh, yes, I’m all right now,” replied the watchman. “I’m getting better every minute. I’ll tell you as much as I know.”
“Take a little of this medicine and you’ll feel stronger,” advised Jerry, holding a glass to the man’s lips. When Sud had partaken of it, he resumed:
“It must have been about eleven o’clock last night, when I was just getting ready to turn in, that I heard some persons coming to the shed. By the way they walked I knew there was more than one, and I was wondering if you boys had decided to make a night trip, without speaking to me about it. Well, I went to the door, when there came a knock on it—the small back door, you know,” he said, and the boys nodded comprehendingly. “You can imagine my surprise when I saw Noddy Nixon, and two persons with him. Noddy walked right in, as if he owned the place, and told the others to come in, too.”
“Who were they?” interrupted Jerry.
“One was Jack Pender,” replied the watchman, and Jerry nodded his head. Well he knew Pender, an unscrupulous crony of Noddy’s, who had, more than once, made trouble for the motor boys.
“And who was the other?” Ned wanted to know.
“He was a stranger,” said Sud. “An old man, with a long white beard, and a peculiar scar on his jaw.”
“What sort of a mark?” inquired Bob.
“It was shaped like the letter L as near as I could make out.”
“What’s that?” cried Jerry. “Like the letter L, you say? And an old man, with a white beard? Yet it’s hardly possible that it can be he——”
“Who?” inquired Bob excitedly.
“The old hermit of Lost Lake,” answered Jerry musingly. “You know, fellows, he had just such a scar; but what would he be doing here, especially in company with Noddy Nixon? No, it can’t be!”
“I don’t know what sort of a man you’re speaking of,” went on Sud, “but this man seemed to know you. He spoke of Bob and Ned, and said he now owed so much to you that he could never repay it. He added that if he could use the airship to rescue the people from the deep valley he would be more than ever in your debt.”
“Rescue people from the valley? Be in our debt? And he spoke as if he knew us?” fired Jerry at the watchman. “Then it must have been the old hermit, Jackson Bell, whom we rescued—and whose son, Bobby, we saved from the gang of Mexicans. But I can’t understand it—it seems incredible—how came he here—how did he come to mention all this?” and Jerry looked with a puzzled air at Sud Snuffles, who was rapidly recovering.
“He didn’t mention it all at once,” said the watchman. “The old hermit, if that’s what you call him, let out by degrees what I have told you. So his name was Jackson Bell, eh? Well, Noddy didn’t call him anything.”
“Probably he did not want you to remember the name,” suggested Bob. “But I’m sure it’s the same man.” The description of the rescue of the hermit will be found in the book “The Motor Boys Across the Plains; or the Hermit of Lost Lake.”
“What else did you hear, and what happened?” inquired Ned.
“Well, I was naturally surprised to see Noddy and the two persons with him,” resumed the watchman, “and more so when Noddy gave me a note, and said Jerry Hopkins had written it, and that it was permission for him to take out the airship.”
“A note from me?” cried Jerry. “Let’s see it!”
Sud Snuffles fumbled in his pocket, and brought out a crumpled paper, which he extended to Jerry, who eagerly scanned it.
“A rank forgery,” he pronounced it, “yet good enough to fool you, Sud, especially at night.”
“What does the note say?” asked Andy.
“It reads: ‘Permission is hereby given Noddy Nixon and his friends to take out the Comet,’ and it’s signed with my name,” replied Jerry. “But go on, Sud. What happened next?”
“Well, when I saw the note I thought everything was all right, though it looked queer. Still it wasn’t up to me to say anything. Then Noddy went around as if he owned the place, and he began explaining to the old man with the white beard how the airship worked. He said that in it he could rescue the friends of the old man without any trouble.”
“I wonder what that rescue means?” mused Jerry. “Can some of Mr. Bell’s friends be held prisoners; and has he come to us for help, only to be roped in by Noddy Nixon?”
“It looks that way,” declared Bob.
“There’s some mystery here,” asserted Ned, “and it’s up to us to solve it.”
“And we’ll do it!” exclaimed Jerry. “Go on, Sud, tell us all you can. This is getting deeper and deeper.”
“There was some talk between Jerry and the old hermit, as you call him,” resumed the watchman. “The hermit said he would pay well for the use of the airship, and Noddy seemed to know all about running it.”
“Yes, though he hasn’t had much experience, he can run an airship all right,” admitted Ned. “He’s watched us.”
“Well,” went on Sud Snuffles, “they talked of going out West, and as I knew you boys had planned to go on your vacation in the Comet I wondered at your giving permission for that. It was this talk that made me suspicious, and I hung around where Noddy was talking to Mr. Bell, as you say his name was. That seemed to make Noddy mad, and he told me to go to bed. I wouldn’t do it, and, when the elderly man was away up in the front part of the airship cabin—for he inspected every part of it—Noddy and Jack Pender came close to me. Before I knew what was happening they both sprang at me, and knocked me down. I tried to yell and I fought as well as I could, but they were too much for me. The last I remember is feeling them tie something over my mouth, then I smelled something queer, and I seemed to go to sleep. The next thing I knew after hearing confused sounds, as if something was being smashed, was when you awakened me.”
“The smashing you heard was them battering away at the big bolts on the front door,” was Bob’s opinion, and his chums nodded. The portal fastened with bars and bolts instead of a lock and key.
“Well, I, for one, can’t understand all of it,” said Andy. “Whoop! But things must have happened, though.”
“Several things very evidently happened,” remarked Jerry dryly, “and rather mysterious happenings they were, too,” and then the leader of the motor boys explained his view of the matter. It was his opinion that Mr. Jackson Bell, at one time a hermit, but whom the boys had not seen in some time, had come East with a view of providing for the rescue of some persons (his friends, probably) from some strange valley. Unexpectedly he had met with Noddy Nixon, so Jerry believed, and Noddy had seized the opportunity to make some money out of Mr. Bell, deceiving him as to the ownership of the airship.
Jerry explained how he believed that Noddy had forged the note he took to Sud Snuffles, accompanied by Jack Pender, and the former hermit.
“Everything went well, I think,” went on Jerry, “until after Noddy had handed over the forged note, and prepared to take away our airship. Then he became fearful that it would be evidence against him, and he and Jack attacked Sud, to take the note away. They rendered the watchman unconscious, smashed open the big doors, and floated out in the Comet, for Noddy has seen us operate it often enough to understand the mechanism. Now the question is, to decide where they have gone. Very likely Noddy set off in quest of the mysterious valley, that Mr. Bell knows about.”
“Anyhow, I’m glad I managed to keep the forged note,” observed Sud Snuffles.
“Yes, it will be a sort of clew,” remarked Bob.
“It’s a wonder Mr. Bell didn’t get suspicious and leave when Noddy and Jack were struggling with Sud,” suggested Ned.
“He probably didn’t hear the fight,” was Jerry’s opinion. “Mr. Bell (if it really was he) was, very likely, in the cabin of our airship, and the fight, as Sud says, took place at the rear of the shed. Besides, probably Mr. Bell was thinking so deeply over the prospective rescue of his friends from danger, that he paid little attention to anything else.”
“What danger do you suppose his friends are in, Jerry?” asked Bob.
“Haven’t the least idea. It must be something desperate, though, to induce him to seek an airship with which to rescue them. It’s a mystery—a mystery of the air, and we’ve got to solve it.”
“Suppose we can’t?” asked Ned. “Maybe we’ll never see the Comet again. Noddy Nixon may smash it all to pieces.”
“Don’t suggest such a thing!” begged Jerry earnestly. “We’ll get right after Noddy, and we’ll try to get at the bottom of the mystery. If Mr. Bell, or his friends, are in trouble we will help them, and, if necessary, in the Comet, for we’ll get it away from Noddy and Jack. Then we’ll see what will happen.”
“But how are we going to chase after Noddy?” asked Bob. “We haven’t anything that can go as fast as the Comet.”
“Not quite as swiftly, but nearly,” answered Jerry with a smile. “Our automobile! We’ll get that out, and get right on the trail of this mystery! Come on, fellows! We’ve lost enough time as it is! Now for the chase!” and Jerry started back toward his house, followed by his chums and Sud Snuffles.