Mrs. Hardy shook her head doubtfully, but said nothing. She knew that her detective husband had escaped death at the hands of desperate criminals many times in the course of his career and there seemed to be no reason why he should not bring Baldy Turk to book just as he had captured many other notorious criminals in the past; but this time she had a vague premonition of danger. She knew that her husband would laugh at her fears if she expressed them, so she remained silent.
The rain had stopped, as Frank noticed when he glanced out the window again.
"It's clearing up. What say we go out for a spin, Joe?"
"Suits me."
"Let's go."
"Don't be late for supper," warned Mrs. Hardy, as the boys started out the door.
"We'll be in time," they promised, and the door closed behind them.
The Hardy boys went out to the shed where they kept their motorcycles. Both Joe and Frank had machines, given to them by their father, and in their spare time they spent many hours speeding about the roads in and around Bayport.
Their native city had a population of about fifty thousand people and was on the Atlantic coast, on Barmet Bay. There were good roads along both northern and southern arms of the bay, besides the State highway and the numerous country roads that led through the farming country back of Bayport.
Chet Morton, whose father was a real estate dealer with an office in the city, lived on a farm some distance off the road along the north arm of the bay, Chet making the daily journey to school and back in a roadster that had been given to him by his father. Chet was as proud of his roadster as the Hardy boys were proud of the motorboat that they had bought from the money they had received as reward for solving the Tower Mystery.