“Out front,” replied Frank.
“You, Bill, sneak in and get a couple of your mother’s long coats, and Frank will take Dee and Bill and me up to the landing-field at Camp Taylor where I parked my plane. I want the kids to look like a couple of girls going out of here, so if we are seen or watched they will not spot Dee. I hope for an hour or two before they find he is gone. Bill can come back. You, Eddie, get down to the end of the Park, where the bushes are thick, and watch that house. If anyone goes out, follow him. And for the love of Mike don’t let a cop catch you, because you can’t explain. See? This is not a little hold-up or second-story job. It may be the discovery of the gang that has been sending infernal machines all over the United States. I am going to fly with Dee over to the United States Intelligence Branch of the War Department at Cincinnati and let Dee tell his story.”
Bill came hustling out in a moment with coats and hats, and the two tall boys (not as tall as Mrs. Wolfe, however) enveloped themselves in her wraps and walked sedately out of the front door and stepped into the chugging flivver.
Fifteen minutes later at Aviation Field a man and a slim boy left the car and hurried aloft in a little racer that belonged to Ernest, setting their faces toward Cincinnati.
Frank and Bill went back home and not knowing just what part to take, went up to the club room to wait for news of Eddie. Half an hour later, just as dawn was beginning to streak the sky, he appeared. A half dozen morning newspapers were under his arm and he looked the early-bird of a newsie to the life. But he flung his papers on the floor and himself into the biggest chair.
“Oh, gee!” he said in a hushed voice, “things are didding down there at Dee’s. I say that is an old whale when it comes to plots.”
“Don’t gabble,” demanded Frank. “Tell us, did you see anything?”
Eddie refused to give up his information except in his own way.
“Have a heart, man!” he said, waving a grubby paw at Frank. “Can’t you see I am all out of breath?” He panted loudly a couple of times, then condescended to tell his experience.
“I went down there in the bushes,” he said, “and glued my eyes to that house. There wasn’t a soul in the street, and nobody came. But by-and-by I thought I saw someone sneaking around the corner from the back and sure enough there were two men pussy-footing it up the front porch. Well, someone must have been watching for them because as soon as they reached the door it slid open a little bit and they went in. They didn’t have time to ring at all. When I saw that there were no more of them, I skinned across and tried to see in the windows.”