“Donner vetter!” he wailed. “The ladder has fallen! How vee gedt down?”
“It didn’t fall, it was pushed, Schmidt!” cried Ned exultingly, unable to forego his delight in his triumph. “You can’t get down till the police come and help you down.”
“Blitzen!” roared the German. “It’s der poy from der nafy!”
“That’s who it is,” cried Ned, “and next time, think it over before you try to beat him! So long!”
As he vanished through the door leading to the passage, a howl of fury and rage went up from the roof. Imprisoned upon it by the Yankee lad’s ingenuity and grit were as choice an assortment of rascals as ever were trapped by a strategist who was in years only a lad.
CHAPTER VIII.
“MY ADDRESS IS THE ‘MANHATTAN’.”
Ned sprang into the hallway, locked the solid, iron-studded door behind him and flung the key away.
“Bottled and corked!” he chuckled as he sped on toward the room in which he had been made captive by Schmidt’s gang.
He stepped into the place and found to his delight that the naval men he wanted were still there. A few of the loungers were likewise seated about. At Ned’s sudden appearance the men-o’-war’s-men leaped up as if they had been shot. Among them was young Childs. He could not meet Ned’s eye but hung his head as the gunner’s-mate made his unexpected entrance.