"We're out here to take pictures," Jimmie cut in. "We have nothing to do with that dispatch. It was given to us by an acquaintance to send out."
"He wanted to make sure it got into the right hands," Jack said.
"Will you call Washington and see if he's there—the chief?"
"You'll have to pay for the message."
Jack laid a banknote of large denomination down on the desk.
"Ask for the chief," he said, "and tell him to wire any instructions he may have for the sender in cipher if he wants to, but to give any instructions he may have for us about the delivery of the message in plain United States!"
"Come back in half an hour," said the clerk, "and I'll probably have something for you. I suppose this cipher message is an important one?" he added, suspiciously.
"Don't know what it is," Jack answered, truthfully.
The clerk evidently did not believe the boy for he stood at the desk gazing after him with a look of distrust on his face. The lads were no sooner out of the office than a thin, angular gentleman, dusky of face and very black and bright of eye, entered and walked up to the clerk.
"I sent a message here by a couple of boys," he said, "and I wish to withdraw it."
"You'll have to find the boys, then, and have them withdraw it," replied the clerk.