“Follow them,” said Joe determinedly. “We’ve started on this thing, let’s see it through.”
They struck out toward the ruins at a half run. In their excitement, prudence was temporarily thrown to the winds. Soon they were stumbling and barking their shins amidst the ruinous pile. In the dark it was almost impossible to see their way. All at once Nat, who was in the lead, gave a sharp exclamation:
“Get back, Joe! Back, as quick as your legs will let you!”
CHAPTER XXVI.
DING-DONG’S CLUE.
Ding-dong Bell, released early from the, to him, irksome task of stock-taking in his father’s store, was making the last adjustments on the new shore wireless station which was to place him in communication with his chums on Goat Island. He hummed away at the work he loved, as busy as a bee and as active as a squirrel. The new station was in the backyard of his home and at some distance from the house, owing to Mrs. Bell’s nervous fears that it would attract lightning.
The boy had tried to explain to her that a properly grounded apparatus presents no such danger, but the good lady would not be convinced; so Ding-dong had been compelled to set up his instruments in an old tool shed, rather than in his own room as he had fondly hoped. He was now rigging up a “wireless alarm-clock,” connecting it with his room so that when anyone called him he could be summoned day or night.
He was stringing the wires for this when, from the road outside, came the sharp “chug-chug-chug” of a motorcycle. It stopped at the back of the shed and a cheery voice hailed:
“Hello, Ding!”
“He-he-hello, yourself, Pepper,” cried Ding-dong, as, hurrying out of the shed at the summons, he came face to face with a lad of about his own age whose head was thatched with a mop of brilliant red hair. He had been nicknamed Red Pepper, shortened to Pepper, and his last name was Rodman.