One of the game wardens chanced to live near the Morton farm, and as he was on his way into Bayport next morning to give evidence against the two men arrested, he fell in with Chet and in the course of their conversation chanced to mention the two boys who had so neatly blundered into the trap the previous night.
"Said they were lookin' for auto thieves," he chuckled.
"What did they look like?" asked Chet, interested.
"One was dark and tall. The other was about a year younger. A fair-haired chap."
Chet snorted. The Hardy boys! No one else.
"What are you laughin' about?" asked the game warden.
"Nothing. I just happened to think of something."
On his way to school, Chet stopped off at a butcher's shop long enough to purchase a small fish, which he carefully wrapped in paper. He was one of the first students in the classroom and he watched his opportunity, putting the parcel in Frank Hardy's desk. Then, before the Hardy boys arrived, he put in the time acquainting his chums with the events of the previous night, so that by the time Frank and Joe came in sight there was scarcely a student in the school who did not know of their blunder.
"It sure is one on the Hardy boys," remarked Tony Prito.
"I'll say it is," returned Biff Hooper. "They don't usually trip up like that."