The Dreadnought Boys on Aero Service

"I'm certain," declared the farmer's wife positively. "He came here soon after my husband drove off to town. He asked for something to eat, which I gave him. When he had finished he frightened me by demanding money. I gave him what little I had, but he insisted that my husband had more concealed about the premises. If you had not come in time, I do not know what I should have done. But whom have I got to thank? You – you," looking hesitatingly at the queer combination of aviation costume and regulation jackie uniform the lads wore, "you aren't soldiers, be you?"

"Not yet, ma'am," rejoined Herc gravely, "although at times we are tempted to soldier."

"We're soldiers' first cousins," laughed Ned.

"Oh, I see, sailors. But then, what is that contraption out there?" She pointed out of the window at the aeroplane. "I saw one like it at the county fair. Be you flying sailors?"

"I guess that's just what we are, ma'am," laughed Ned. "And that reminds me that we must be getting along. It is going on for noon."

He appeared about to go, and Herc was following his example, when the woman checked them.

"Oh, you must not go till you have told me your names," she said. "My husband would like to thank you personally for your bravery."

"As for our names, they are soon given," said Ned. "But for thanks – I guess it's the duty of Uncle Sam's sailors to do all they can to help the weak, and – "

"Land the bullies," finished Herc, with a flourish of his fist.

"Only this time it looks as if the bully had landed us," put in Ned, with a chuckle.

"Humph!" grunted Herc, feeling his head ruefully. "But," he added, cheering up vastly, "we had him on the run, anyhow."

"That's so," agreed Ned, "and I see, 'by the same token,' as Mulligan says, that he was in such a hurry he left the spoons behind him."

He pointed to a scattered heap at the door which the farmer's wife pounced upon gratefully. The spoons were all there but one, and Kennell's exit must have been hurried, to judge by this fact. Evidently he had dropped them by accident and had not tarried to pick them up.

While the farmer's wife looked on in wonderment, and not a little fear, Ned and Herc prepared their machine for flight. In a little less than ten minutes' time, they had taken the air with a roar and whirr, throwing the domestic animals about the place into panic. Without incident they winged their way back to the aviation field, arriving there in time for a hearty noon-day dinner at the farmhouse.

Ned's head was bandaged, and Herc's cheek was swollen, but they volunteered no explanation of their injuries, and Lieutenant De Frees concluded that they had met with some slight accident of which they did not care to speak, and deemed it best not to ask questions.

During the noon-day meal, Ned watched the countenances of Merritt and Chance narrowly. Although he had not the slightest thing to base his belief upon, an obstinate idea had entered his head and would not leave it, and that was, that they had, in some manner, something to do with the occurrences of the morning. He mentioned this to Herc afterward, but was laughed at for his pains.

"It was some sort of a hard-hitting ghost that landed me that sleep wallop," declared Herc, who, as we know, was reprehensibly given to slang on all occasions.

The afternoon passed quietly. Merritt and Chance asked leave to go into the town, which was not far off, and they were granted an afternoon's furlough. In what manner they employed it, we shall learn before long. Ned and Herc watched them go off, arm in arm, and Herc turned to Ned with an indignant snort.

"Whoof! I'll bet those chaps are up to some more cussedness. Look how they've got their heads together. Wonder what they are plotting now?"

"Don't know, and don't much care," laughed Ned; "tell you what, Herc, you'd better get out and practice, instead of wasting time on speculations over Merritt, Chance and Co. By the way, I wonder what they would say if they knew that their old acquaintance, Kennell, was at large and up to his old tricks?"

"Join him, probably. Especially if it was in anything that would make trouble for us," returned Herc. "But what are you going to do this afternoon?"

Herc had noticed that Ned had not donned his aviation "uniform."

"I? Oh, Lieutenant De Frees told me I could get my drawings in shape for his examination of them to-night. He is to have one or two naval experts at his quarters, whom he is anxious to show them to. Herc, old boy, maybe we're on the highway to fame."

"Maybe you are, you mean," flashed back Herc. "I guess I'll be the same old stick-in-the-mud till the end of the chapter."

"Nonsense. Use your initiative. Think up something new in connection with our present line of work."

"A new way to tumble, for instance," grinned Herc.

"There you go. That's your great fault. You can never be serious for two minutes together."

"I can, too," remonstrated Herc indignantly. "That time I was in the brig on the Manhattan I was serious till – till they brought my dinner."

Ned couldn't help laughing at his whimsical chum's frank way of putting things. But presently he resumed, more seriously.

"Come, Herc, you don't do yourself justice. You laugh away your real ability. Look here, I'll give you an idea to work on. See what you can do with it."

"I'm all cheers – ears, I mean," declared Herc, leaning forward in interested fashion.

Ned realized that the flippant tone hid real interest. Without seeming to notice it, he went on.

"One of the most needed improvements in the modern aeroplane – I mean where it is used in warfare – is a perfected appliance for bomb-dropping. The present way is pretty clumsy. An aviator has to let go of his controls with one hand while he manipulates his bomb-dropping device with the other. Some bit of apparatus that would do the work, say by foot-power, would be a big improvement, and add a whole lot to the effectiveness of the machine using it."

Herc kindled to enthusiasm while Ned talked. His careless manner vanished.

"That's like you, Ned," he said with real warmth of affection, "always ready to help a fellow out. I'll try to work out something on the lines you suggested. It's time I did something, anyhow. But the idea will still be yours, no matter what I do with it."

"Pshaw!" chuckled Ned, "didn't Shakespeare work over old stories into great plays?"

"I suppose so," agreed Herc, who did not care to display his almost total darkness concerning the late Mr. Shakespeare and his methods.

CHAPTER IX

A CONSPIRACY IS RIPENING

"That you, boys?"

The speaker emerged from a patch of gloomy looking bushes, masking an old stone bridge.

"Yes, it's us all right, Herr Muller. On time, ain't we?"

It was Chance who spoke. Close behind came Merritt and another figure.

"Yes, you're on time, all right. But who's that with you? I don't want outsiders mixed up in this."

Merritt came forward with the third member of the newly arrived party. "This is Bill Kennell, an old chum of ours," he said. "He's all right, and we may find him useful in our plans."

"Very well, if you'll vouch for him."

It was noticeable that all trace of accent had now vanished from Herr Muller's tone. In fact, except for a very slight trace of foreign pronunciation, impossible to reproduce, he spoke remarkably good English.

"Oh, we'll vouch for him. And now to business," said Merritt, seating himself on the coping of the bridge. "You said this afternoon that you, as representative of the New York group of International Anarchists, would pay us well to keep you in possession of the latest moves of the United States navy."

"Yes, yes," responded the other eagerly, "we wish to know all – everything – I am authorized to pay you well for such information."

"But why – why do you want it?" demanded Chance bluntly.