But the Hardy boys did not wait to reply. With a whoop of delight they rushed through the living room and into the library, where they found Fenton Hardy seated at the table. Their father got up quickly as they rushed at him, and in a moment all three were shaking hands and chattering in gladness and relief.
"We heard you'd been caught by the gang!" gasped Frank.
Fenton Hardy smiled. "It was the other way around," he corrected them. "The gang was caught by me."
"And we caught the rest of them!"
"Not Red Hawkins and his crew?"
The Hardy boys nodded. Their father gazed at them in incredulous astonishment for a moment. Then he slapped them heartily on the back and indicated the chairs near by.
"And I thought they'd clear out when they knew Baldy and the others were behind the bars! Why, this rounds up the entire pack! Tell me about it. But—first of all, have Chet and Biff been found?"
The boys nodded.
"We found them on Blacksnake Island. That's how we rounded up the gang. They captured Chet and Biff in mistake for us. They had 'em in a cave."
Then, in the seclusion of the study, the Hardy boys told of their search for the missing chums, of their deduction that the boys might have gone to Blacksnake Island, of their arrival on the island and the finding of the gangsters and their cave.