"Smugglers?" repeated Linda, aghast.
"Yes. You know all about it. Don't look innocent! We've had wind for over a month of the fact that a plane was taking something from Canada to Plattsburg, but we just found out last week what it was—_French lace_! And a girl has been flying it!"
Instantly both Linda and Louise understood what had happened. They were being arrested for Bess Hulbert's crime!
"But neither of us is the girl you're after—the girl that's guilty!" protested Louise. "That girl flew a gray Moth!"
"Yeah? And how do we know your plane wasn't a gray Moth? How are you going to prove that? And didn't you admit you'd just come from that Convent, and didn't you show my friend Marshall here, some of the goods?"
"But those are our own things!" cried Louise. "Bought in Columbus, Ohio!"
"Oh, yeah? Well, I don't happen to believe that.... What I do know, is you didn't stop at the border for the regular search, did you?"
"We didn't know you had to.... We didn't even know the border when we came to it," remarked Linda, bitterly.
"No? Well, you can tell that to the judge!" replied the sergeant, with a smirk. "I guess you don't even know yet whether you're in the U.S. or not?"
"No, as a matter of fact, we don't."