“Look here,” cried the boy, pointing to the engine, “some one has been tampering with the carbureter. They knew we could not replace it here without weeks of delay.”
“And by jimminy crickets!” cried Billy, who had been examining the engine on his own hook, “they must have been scared away just as we came down. See here,” went on the reporter, “they left in such a hurry that one of them forgot his hat and the sweatband is still warm and damp. Whoever monkeyed with this engine took off his hat to do it and he couldn’t have been at work very long for the hat’s still warm and besides, see here, he has only given the carbureter a few turns.”
Mr. Chester took the hat that the excited Billy thrust at him and regarded it with some attention. It was a greasy battered affair, but it was trimmed with a new black ribbon on which was sewn in red thread the words “Viva Zelaya.”
“Not difficult to trace some of our old friend Rogero’s work here,” he said. “He evidently means to keep his threat to prevent your flying.”
“We shall have to do sentry duty here for the rest of the night, Harry,” said Frank in a determined voice.
“You bet we will,” agreed his younger brother; an injury to their ship affected these boys far more than any hurt they themselves might sustain.
Rifles were secured from the house, also blankets, and the boys made up a regular camp-fire round which they sat long after Don Pachecho and his bereaved daughter had driven off and the lights in the house had been extinguished.
“I tell you what, Frank,” said Harry, “we have simply got to take a hand in this thing now. You know that if that fellow Rogero ever gets as far as this what he means to do to this plantation.”
“I know,” rejoined his brother, “he would take delight in ruining what father has built up and then blaming it on his troops and the worst of it is we would never be able to get any redress.”
Both boys were silent for several minutes, thinking things over.