“But—but there must be a set there,” insisted Tom, utterly unable to believe that they had been mistaken. “Why, we were all around there with our loops and we got cross bearings and knew he was there.”
“It’s a bit mysterious, I grant,” replied Mr.
Henderson. “I fully expected we’d locate it, but my men will swear there isn’t even a piece of radio apparatus in the block. They went through it with a fine-tooth comb. Either you boys were mistaken or else the fellow’s moved away. If you hear him again you’ll know whether he’s changed his location. I’m afraid you’ll never locate him by your instruments, though. I’ve used those loops as direction finders at sea and to some extent ashore and I admit I can’t see how you went wrong, but we’ve got to face the fact that he’s not there—at least not now.”
Thoroughly disappointed and discouraged, the boys left the office and for hours discussed the matter with one another, but at the end of the time were no nearer a solution than ever.
“Oh, bother the old thing, anyhow!” exclaimed Tom at last. “We’ve had our fun and now let’s do something else. Dad’s leaving Nassau to-morrow and we can try sending to him when he gets nearer. Wonder what he’ll say about this thing.”
“Yes, but it gets my goat to think that Mr. Henderson will think we’re such dubs,” said Frank.
“He thinks we’ve made some big mistake and put him to all that trouble for nothing.”
“Well, let’s forget it,” suggested Henry, and this seeming the best advice the boys followed it and were soon so busy experimenting along new lines that the mysterious conversations almost slipped from their minds, and as no further messages were heard from the same source they decided that by some coincidence the sender had moved bag and baggage from his former location just in time to escape detection by the men Mr. Henderson had sent on the search.
Tom and Frank were overjoyed when, a day before Mr. Pauling’s ship docked, they succeeded in getting a message to him.
“That’s pretty near 300 miles,” declared Tom jubilantly, “and our set’s only supposed to send 100. Say, that’s a real freak message.”