"I happen to know that there"s a big pan of rice pudding in the ice box," said Jimmy. "It may be late, but it"s never too late for that, is it?"
"Lead us to it!" the other three chanted in unison, and in a short time the rice pudding was only a memory. Then the boys said good-night and parted, each to his own home, well satisfied with the result of their adventure.
Bob and Joe were walking down Main Street the next day, when they met Buck Looker and Carl Lutz, both looking very much the worse for wear.
Joe stopped and gazed at them in apparent astonishment.
"Why, what have you fellows been doing, anyway?" he inquired. "You look as though you had had an argument with a steam roller."
"Yes, and the steam roller must have won," grinned Bob.
"You know well enough what happened to us," growled Buck Looker malignantly. "If ever you fellows come around our clubhouse again, we"ll make you wish you hadn"t."
"Clubhouse?" queried Joe innocently. "What does he mean, Bob?
I didn"t know he and Lutz had a clubhouse."
"I mean that garage back of the Mooney"s place," said Buck irately.
"That"s our clubhouse, and you fellows had better not try any rough house there again, or there"ll be trouble."
"Oh, I know the place he means," said Bob, after making a pretence of puzzled thinking. "He means that tumbled-down shack where Mr. Mooney keeps his garden tools. I"m sure we"d never want to go near a place like that, would we, Joe?"
"Of course not," said Joe. "I wouldn"t ask a respectable dog to go near that place."
Looker and Lutz had been growing angrier all the time during this dialogue, but after their recent experiences with the radio boys they did not quite dare resort to open hostilities. But if looks could have killed, Bob and Joe would have dropped dead on the spot.
"If you"ve got anything to say, now"s the time to say it," said Bob, gazing steadily at the bullies with a look in his eyes that made them shift uneasily.
"We"re in a big hurry, or we"d tend to you right now," bl.u.s.tered Buck. "Come on, Carl. We"ll fix them some other time."
"No time like the present, you know," said Joe.
But the two bullies had little inclination for a fair fight, as they had a pretty shrewd suspicion of how they would fare in that event.
With ugly sidewise looks they pa.s.sed on, leaving Bob and Joe in possession of the field.
"They"re beginning to think we"re bad medicine," said Joe. "A little more training, Bob, and they"ll even be afraid to talk back to us."
"Looks that way, doesn"t it," said Bob, laughing.
The two radio boys went on to their destination, which was the hardware store, where they both wanted to buy some wire and other supplies. What was their surprise, when they went inside, to find Frank Brandon, the radio inspector, talking to the proprietor.
As the boys entered, Brandon glanced at them, and then, as recognition came into his eyes, he extended his hand.
"h.e.l.lo, there!" he exclaimed. "How have you been since I saw you?
How"s the wireless coming on?"
"It"s O K," said Bob. "We"re both trying for the Ferberton prize, you know."
"That"s fine," said Brandon heartily. "The prizes are to be given out pretty soon, aren"t they?"
"Yes. And we"re both hoping that if one of us doesn"t get it, the other will," said Joe. "If neither one gets it, it won"t be anything against you," said Brandon. "I hear there are a lot of sets entered, and some of the fellows who have made them have been at the game a lot longer than you have."
"We"re doing a lot of hoping, anyway," said Bob. "Are they keeping you pretty busy these days?"
"I should say so," said the radio inspector. "There"s one fellow in particular that I"m having a lot of trouble with. I"ve got his location approximately, but in the neighborhood where he should be I haven"t been able to locate any antennae to indicate the presence of a radio station. Usually it"s easy enough, but this fellow seems to be a sly fox."
"How in the world do you locate an unauthorized station, anyway?"
queried Bob.
"In each district in which there is a radio inspector we have what we call directional finders. These consist of a combination of a loop aerial and a compa.s.s and a radio receiving set. We have complete maps of the district. When the man we"re after is sending, we swing the loop aerial around until the signals reach their loudest tone. Then a reading is taken on the compa.s.s. This action is repeated several times, after which we turn the loop so as to tune out all sound.
During the silent period a line is drawn on the map at right angles to the direction of the loop. This line indicates the direction from which the sounds are coming. This takes place at the same time at all three stations, and where the lines on the map intersect is the point where the offender can be found."
"But I suppose that location isn"t very exact, is it?" asked Bob.
"No; but it"s usually exact enough," said Brandon. "We go to the place indicated on the map, and look about in the neighborhood for aerials.
Anybody owning them has to show his license, if he has one, and if he hasn"t--well, that"s the man we"re after."
"Simple enough," commented Bob. "But when you don"t know how it"s done, it seems like looking for a needle in a haystack."
"Yes, and by all the rules it should be easier than usual to locate this offender," said the radio inspector, "because he has a peculiarity that marks him out."
"I"ll bet I know what it is, too," said Bob quickly.
"You do?" said Brandon, surprised.
"He stutters badly, and then has to whistle before he can go on, doesn"t he?" said Bob.
"That"s the man, all right," said Brandon. "Do you know anything about him?"
"Well, if he"s the man we think he is, we don"t know much good about him," said Bob, and he proceeded to tell Brandon about Dan Ca.s.sey and the mean way he had tricked Nellie Berwick and stolen her money.
"So you see you"re not the only one looking for the stuttering man,"
said Bob, in conclusion. "We"d like pretty well to find out where he is ourselves."
"But what makes you think this man I"m looking for is the same one you"re after?" asked Brandon.
"In the first place, there aren"t many people who stutter so badly,"
said Bob. "And in the second place, Miss Berwick told us that she saw some radio apparatus on his desk when she was in his office."
"That certainly goes a long way in hitching up the two," said the inspector thoughtfully. "Now," he continued, after studying a few minutes longer, "I have a proposition to make. I"ve checked up my calculations, and I"m going to have another try at locating this man to-morrow. As you"re both interested in finding him, too, why not go with me and help me? Between the three of us we ought to find him."
"Nothing could suit me better!" exclaimed Bob. "How about you, Joe?"
"Fine," replied his chum. "To-morrow"s Sat.u.r.day, so we can go all right. But don"t forget that we want to be back when the prize winners are announced," he said, struck by a sudden thought.
"Oh, it won"t take us very long to get on the ground," said Brandon.
"I figure this man we"re after is somewhere in Lansdale, and you know that isn"t more than a two hours" run by automobile. If we haven"t found him by the time you should be leaving in order to get back here on time, you two can come back by train, and I"ll stay there. But if we get an early start I think the three of us, working together, should locate our man pretty quickly. Lansdale isn"t a very large place, you know."
"I can start as early as you like," said Bob. "How about you, Joe?"