“Bad,” he said; “I’ll tell you what it is,” he added with a crafty look in his eyes; “if we find this money we don’t need to tell Hank anything about it. We’ll just split it among ourselves. He’ll never leave that bed in the hospital, and it’s just as well for us he won’t.”
“Hold on there a minute, Mr. Hunt,” said Bill Bender; “I won’t consent to that. Hank was pretty square with us and we’ll be square with him. He’ll get his share of the money if it’s there.”
“Don’t be foolish,” remonstrated Stonington Hunt, in his smooth, crafty voice; “he cannot use it and we can. I tell you——”
“Look! Look!” interrupted Freeman Hunt, the youngest member of the party, who had been sitting forward; “what’s that over there by the mansion? See, it’s rising into the air!”
“It’s an aeroplane!” burst out his father; “bother it all, I hope they don’t come flying out this way.”
“They’re a nuisance,” agreed Jack Curtiss, watching like the others the graceful evolutions of the white-winged flying machine as it rose from amid the dark trees and began to circle about like a gliding hawk.
All at once it made a lofty sweep and then started off in a straight line toward the Vesper.
“Look, she’s coming out to sea!” cried Freeman, delightedly, lost in admiration. “Say, she’s a dandy.”
“Why, the thing can fly,” admitted his father, grudgingly, “and—and—why, what’s that fellow in her doing? He’s unfastening something. A black object that is hanging down under the seat. It’s a round thing. It looks like—like—a bomb! Great Scott! He’s going to blow the Vesper up.”
“Rot!” sneered Jack Curtiss, but his face was very pale. As for Bill Bender and Freeman Hunt, they said nothing, but watched the aeroplane soaring far above them with open mouths and staring eyes.