"Could it be some one who is projecting a deadly wireless force which causes the explosions?" I put in, mindful of a previous case of Kennedy's. "We all know that inventors have been working for years on the idea of making explosives obsolete and guns junk. If some one has hit on a way of guiding an electric wave through the air and concentrating power at a point, munitions-plants could be wiped out."
MacLeod looked anxiously from me to Kennedy, but Craig betrayed nothing by his face except his interest.
"Sometimes I have imagined I heard a peculiar, faint, whirring noise in the air," he remarked, thoughtfully. "I thought of having the men on the watch for air-ships, but they've never seen a trace of one. It might be some power either like this," he added, shaking the clipping, "or like that which Mr. Jameson suggests."
"It's something like that you meant, I presume, when you called it a 'phantom destroyer' a moment ago?" asked Kennedy.
MacLeod nodded.
"If you're interested," he pursued, hastily, "and feel like going down there to look things over, I think the best place for you to go would be to the Sneddens'. They're some people who have seen a chance to make a little money out of the boom. Many visitors are now coming and going on business connected with the new works. They have started a boarding-house—or, rather, Mrs. Snedden has. There's a daughter, too, who seems to be very popular." Kennedy glanced whimsically at me.
"Well, Walter," he remarked, tentatively, "entirely aside from the young lady, this ought to make a good story for the Star."
"Indeed it ought!" I replied, enthusiastically.
"Then you'll go down to Nitropolis?" queried MacLeod, eagerly. "You can catch a train that will get you there about noon. And the company will pay you well."
"MacLeod, with the mystery, Miss Snedden, and the remuneration, you are irresistible," smiled Kennedy.