“Perhaps it is,” Dick returned absently.
Could it be that Randolph had deceived him? Was it possible that the amazing statement he had made was false, and that, instead of making diamonds, he was experimenting on an aëroplane?
Merriwell did not like to think that the man who had once been a friend to Frank, and whom he himself had found so attractive and likable, would stoop to a thing like that. It was so totally unnecessary, too. He need not have told any story at all had he desired to keep his work a secret. Dick had nailed one lie that night, and if there was one thing he despised above another it was a deliberate liar.
But there was the drawer full of diamonds. They were real enough and bore out the man’s astounding statement. It was a most puzzling situation.
All at once Buckhart caught his friend’s arm.
“Look,” he cried excitedly—“look at the lights!”
Following the direction of the Texan’s hand, Dick strained his eyes to the northward. There certainly were lights there. Brilliant, regular flashes came from high up in the air many miles away. As Merriwell studied them, it seemed to him that some one was signaling from the clouds. If they were really signals, the man was using a secret code and not the regular government system, with which Dick was perfectly familiar. Suddenly they ceased.
“Signals, weren’t they?” Buckhart inquired.
“Looked like it; but I don’t know the code.”
They had reached the car and Dick stooped to crank it. The next instant he let go the handle and stood erect, his head bent back and his eyes upward, in an attitude of strained attention.