“So far, you are here without my invitation,” she said just as coldly as ever, “and I must ask that you leave the place.”
“We will, Mrs. Parsons, by the road at the rear of the house.”
Frank bowed politely to her and strode across the lawn toward the road at the rear, taking pains to pass as close to the house as possible, in order to observe.
Out on the road the boys stopped while Frank gave directions to seek for automobile marks at the side of the road. Very slowly they proceeded. Stopping at one point, Frank looked across the distance stretching toward the river, his eyes carefully searching the trees and shrubbery. Suddenly he gasped, and pointed to an opening.
“Lanky, you go down to that opening right away. When you get to it go slowly, and back out to the river, while I watch.”
In five minutes Lanky was there, backing away through the opening. When he reached the water’s edge, his shoulders were still visible to Frank.
Looking to see where he was, Lanky saw a pasteboard box in which lunch might have been, a discarded tobacco bag, and a piece of rope on the bank. Here was where that rowboat had been tied when they came down the river the night of the robbery!
CHAPTER X
THE ROWBOAT IS FOUND
Lanky Wallace involuntarily gasped as he realized what Frank had sought—and here was a clue at the very start. He wildly waved his arms for the other boys to come.