CHAPTER XV
A MEAN ENEMY
Ben saw at once that the sight of the pin had produced a great effect on the second-hand dealer. He prepared to take advantage of it.
“Why didn’t you say so at first?” inquired the store keeper.
“Say what?” inquired Ben.
The man pointed significantly to the pin that corresponded to the one on the lapel of his own coat.
“You must be one of the boys from Woodville,” he observed.
“That’s where I live.”
“Then you know Knippel?”
“Oh,” said Ben to himself, “I’ve found out his name, have I?” and he said aloud: “I’ve seen him before to-day, yes.”
“What do you want to see him for?” inquired the man curiously. “Say, see here, if you’ve got something to sell, you know it’s all one dealing with me.”
“All right, when I do I’ll come to you. I don’t want to sell anything to Mr. Knippel.”
“What then.”
“Other business. You know he loans money once in a while.”
“I know he is able to, if he wants to,” responded the man. “See here,” he continued eagerly, “what would it be if you came to me again. Not railroad stuff, you know?”
“Certainly not,” answered Ben accommodatingly.
“Too dangerous. Prime stuff is machine shop plunder. Especially brass and copper. I’d give you a fair deal.”
“I’m sure of that,” said Ben. “Say, how am I going to get to Knippel?”
“That’ll be hit and miss. He makes the rounds, you know. He may not be around here again to collect for a week.”
“Where did you say he lived?”
“I didn’t say, but it’s at Blairville.”
“Oh,” nodded Ben. He remembered that it was the town near the aero field.
“You take a chance of finding him there,” proceeded the man, “he flits about so much. Sometimes he isn’t at home once in a month.”
“Well, I’ll try and locate him somehow, much obliged,” said our hero.
“Remember, now, come to me direct when you’ve got anything to sell.”
“All right.”
“Especially brass and copper.”
“Good enough,” said Ben, and left the place.
He walked to the railroad depot reflecting deeply. He had made a pretentious break, a sort of bluff, and had learned what he wanted to know. Ben sturdily believed that the man Knippel knew a great deal that could help his father, and now he knew where to find him.
“The way I size it up,” ruminated Ben, “is that this Knippel has a lot of people in various manufacturing towns around here stealing things and selling to him and his agents. This pin shows membership in the gang. Some one dropped it in the work shed. Who was it? Well, I’ve got my start on this business, and I’m going to work something tangible out of it.”
Ben did not tell his father of his latest experience when he reached home. In fact, he did not even then deliver to him the screws for which he had been sent.
To his surprise he found the work yard deserted. As he passed it, a queer, indefinable sensation of something being out of place assailed him. Ben paused to figure out what it was. Then he noticed that the airship skeleton was partly dismantled and some of its parts gone.
“Father, father, are you there?” he called towards the work shed. There was no reply. Ben hurried towards the house. It was untenanted, but coming out on the porch he came upon his mother. She was standing looking down the street, anxious faced and in tears.
“Why, mother, what is the matter?” exclaimed Ben in great surprise.
“Oh, my son, trouble,” responded Mrs. Hardy in a broken tone of voice.
“Father——”
“Has gone down town in urgent haste. Mr. Saxton is at the bottom of it all.”
“How—explain, mother.”
“It was directly after you went away this morning. Two constables appeared with what they called writs of some kind. It seems that Mr. Saxton claimed that a great deal of valuable automobile parts have been missing from the plant for over a year. The officers searched the work shed.”
“The villain!” fired up Ben hotly. “Did he dare to accuse father of stealing?”
“It seems so,” sighed Mrs. Hardy. “The astonishing thing is that in a corner of the shed behind that barrel in which you keep odds and ends, they found nearly a bushel of carburetor parts.”
“Then they put them there!” cried Ben. “Ah, I understand now. The man you saw with the bag is in the conspiracy to disgrace father. His errand was to place its contents where they would incriminate us. He dumped them out and escaped before I got into the yard.”
“The men then proceeded to take the metal parts from the airship,” resumed Mrs. Hardy.
“Why, those never came from the Saxton plant!” exclaimed Ben. “Father made them right here in the work shed.”
“Your father protested, but the officers claimed they were acting under sanction of the law. They told him he had his redress, and could replevin them, I think it was, if he could prove ownership.”
“Where is father now?”
“He hurried down town to see his lawyer and try to get back those airship parts.”
“I must find him at once,” declared Ben. “Mother, this a pretty serious affair.”
“It is indeed, Ben.”
“It is all a plot, a base, wicked plot!” cried Ben. “Everybody knows that father is the soul of honesty. Mr. Saxton shall suffer for this.”
Ben was all on fire with indignation and excitement. He reached the office of Mr. Pearsons, his father’s lawyer, breathless and perspiring. It was to find his father pacing the floor in a restless, anxious way.
“Oh, father,” exclaimed Ben, “this is terrible!”
“For Saxton, yes,” said Mr. Hardy, in his usual calm and trustful way. “A man who will do what he has done, will wake up with a tormenting conscience some day.”
“But what good does that do us now?”
“Don’t worry, my son, everything will come out right.”
“It’s a pretty hard thing to see you charged with stealing.”
“They will have to prove those charges, Ben.”
“And they have got hold of our new monoplane parts.”
“Mr. Pearsons has just gone to see about those,” said Mr. Hardy.
The lawyer in question entered the office at that moment. He was in great haste. He looked stirred up and bothered.
Mr. Pearsons nodded to Ben. Then he turned towards his anxious-faced father.
“Well, Hardy,” he observed, “we’re dealing with a bad crowd, I can tell you.”
“You mean Mr. Saxton?”
“And his accomplices and lawyers. The recovery of those automobile parts was only a ruse.”
“A ruse?” repeated Mr. Hardy wonderingly.
“Yes.”
“How do you mean, Mr. Pearsons?”
“They were really after the parts of that flying machine of yours.”
“Why?”
“Well, Hardy,” pronounced the lawyer emphatically, “I am satisfied that the motive of this raid is to steal your airship inventions!”