“They’ve tricked us!” cried. Tim. “They’re stealing our own plane!”
The reporters plunged madly toward the field in which they had left their plane but before they had covered half the distance they saw the Good News shoot into the air.
Ralph and Tim, weeping with rage, watched their plane gain altitude and then circle over them.
The pilot leaned far out and waved derisively. Ralph’s answer was to drop on one knee and send a stream of well directed bullets at the plane overhead.
They could see the bullets rip through the wings. Ralph, aiming at the propeller, was undershooting his mark. If he could land just one good shot in the whirling blade, it would disable the plane and bring the bandits back to earth.
Ralph exhausted the supply of ammunition in the magazine of his rifle and was helpless as the bandits headed the Good News in an easterly direction.
“What chumps we were, knowing they couldn’t be far away, to leave the Good News unguarded,” mourned Tim.
“We may have to hunt for new jobs when Carson hears of this,” added Ralph.
“I’m not thinking of that so much as I am the humiliation,” said Tim. “Here the state police feel that we are reliable and brainy enough to help them and then we go and pull a boner like this. I’ll tell Carson what happened if you’ll tell Captain Raymond and Colonel Searle.”
“Here comes the captain now,” said Ralph as a touring car, loaded with state police, skidded to a stop in the gravel.