"What's the matter?" cried Porky. "I ain't doin' any harm! I was tired, and went in there, and I must have gone to sleep. How'd you know I was there? Are you police?"
"Yes, that's it!" said Ledermann. "You've guessed it. We are policemen."
"Where's your uniforms?" he asked then. "You ain't policemen. What you doin' here yourself? You can't arrest me for just goin' to sleep in this dinky little dog house. Gee, I might have slept all night! Guess I'll go along. Pop and Mom'll fix me for bein' so late." He started to rise, but Ledermann pushed him back.
"Not so fast, not so fast, young follow!" he said slowly. "I would like to find out, if possible, just how much asleep you were. You see we don't think you would listen to anything that was not intended for your ears, but we want you to tell us if you did hear any little thing. By mistake, of course."
"Wasting time!" grunted Adolph. "Let me tickle him with my little toy here. Safety first, as these people always say."
"Be quiet!" ordered Ledermann. "And you too, young fellow! If you try to scream, we will kill you."
"Aw, quit your kiddn'!" said Porky cheekily. "What would I want to yell for? I don't want to get arrested any more than I am. I want to go home! tell you, how could I hear anything when I was asleep? I want to go home! What's it to me what you talk about?" He sniffed, and drew his cuff across his eyes.
"Let me have him," said Adolph. "Let me go outside the gates with him."
"No," said Porky, using his cuff again. "I ain't goin' with nobody. I know how to get home. I don't have to have somebody take me." He tried to wiggle away, but felt Adolph's clutch close like an iron vise.
"There, there," said Ledermann quietly, as he nudged Adolph under cover of the darkness. "All we want to know is how much you heard. It is nothing to me what you do after that. You see my friend here does not mean what he says, but—well, I may as well tell you how it is." He turned the flashlight on the boy's face and held it there, watching him like a hawk while he talked. "My friend has invented something that will prove to be a very wonderful thing for everybody in the world, and he is very anxious that it shall be kept a secret until he is ready to put it on the market. Now you are a smart boy, and I will give you one guess to see if you can tell me what we were talking about. Tell me what you think he has invented."