“I guess he did, and was tickled to know that Bloomsbury was going to be on the map again. He asked me a heap of questions, not alone about the message and the dropping of the sand bag, but about our monoplane, and what we expected to do after we got it ready. Why, Casper even remembered that your father had been the well known aviator and balloonist, Professor Bird, once of Cornell.”
“Oh! did he mention that?” breathed Andy, who was always visibly stirred whenever any one spoke of his father. “And Frank, I do hope he gets the name straight. I’d hate so much to see it misspelled; more than ever if he means to mention that I come by my craze naturally.”
“I impressed it upon him good and hard; and Casper promised to print it in big capitals, so that there would be no mixup. And now I’m going to turn in again. It’s a long while to dawn, and what’s the use of our staying up?”
Frank was as good as his word. In ten minutes the shed was wrapped in silence; nor did anything else occur to arouse the boys until the sun, peeping in at some crack, chanced to fall upon the face of Frank, and aroused him.
Andy went in to breakfast, and after he returned to the hangar Frank followed suit; for that was the arrangement, since they did not mean to leave the precious machine alone if it could be helped.
Then they started to work again, for numerous little things remained to be done ere the aeroplane could be deemed in absolutely perfect condition, with every wire taut as a piano string, and the engine working smoothly.
It must have been along about eleven in the morning, when Andy, who had been bending over holding some parts that Frank was adjusting raised his head.
“Somebody coming,” he said, “and it sounds like the rat-tat of Colonel Josiah’s crutch and cane. Say, he’s certainly making speed, all right, like he wanted to see us in a hurry. Wonder what can have happened now, Frank?”
The other immediately crawled out from under the engine of the aeroplane, and hurried to the door, which he opened; to discover that it was the crippled veteran traveler sure enough, and that he was showing signs of some great excitement.