The footsteps and voices sounded nearer. Some persons came into the house. They stumbled about in the darkness. Then a voice asked:
"Are you sure it's safe to talk here?"
"Those are not high school pupils!" Ned said softly to himself. "They're men!"
"It's the safest place in the world," someone replied, in answer to the first question. "No one here but ourselves. Now then, how far have you got with the plans?"
"I had a letter from the lawyers in New York. It seems they have heard from Wright & Johnson and they're going to fight us. Wright & Johnson have written to Frank, so I've heard, but he's puzzled over the whole affair and don't know what to do. Oh, it's safe enough. We've only got the boy to look after and he will never know how to proceed. Besides, old Dent, his uncle, has the wool pulled over his own eyes so thick he'll never make any trouble. I tell you it's safe, and in a few months the property will be ours."
"Where is his—" but Ned could not catch the end of the sentence before the other man replied:
"Good quiet place. In a sanitarium on—"
Just then a door shut, and Ned was unable to hear any further talk of the men, who had so strangely come to the vacant house. He could distinguish the hum of their voices, but that was all.
"I wonder what that means?" he asked himself, as he stood there in the darkness. "It sounds as if there was going to be trouble for Frank."