"Good. Switch it on and we'll see what we can see."
Ned drew out a small object from his pocket. There was a sharp click and a bright ray of light shot out. Here and there about the ground the Dreadnought Boy flashed the tiny searchlight.
"Look here!" cried Herc suddenly.
In triumph he held up a tangled looking object.
"What is it?" asked Ned in a puzzled tone.
"That's easy. It's false hair like the kind we used on the Manhattan when we gave that show. The chaps that attacked you were disguised and this was a part of their makeup."
"I think so, too. But—shades of immortal Farragut!—look here, Herc!" Ned, as he spoke, pounced on a roll of papers lying in the dust at one side of the road, right under a clump of alder bushes.
"It's the plans!" gasped Herc.
"That's right," rejoined Ned, opening the roll and glancing at its contents, "they're all intact, too. One of the rascals that took them must have placed them in his pocket. Then, in pushing into this brush to escape, they were caught and thrown out."