“Hold on!” cried Joe, “you’re going the wrong way.”
“Be easy. It’s all right,” answered the man with a smile. “Your father has taken all his things to a little shop in Denville. He had to have some changes made in the models I believe, and he wanted to be in a machine shop where he could work quietly. He told me to bring you there.”
Joe remembered that on one or two occasions Mr. Matson had had some work done in Denville, and once more the suspicions that had arisen were lulled. Joe sank back on the cushions and began thinking of the game just played. His arm was getting quite stiff.
“I’ll have to attend to it as soon as I get home,” he mused. “It won’t do to have it go back on me just when things are in such good shape. If they keep on I may become the regular pitcher. Sam certainly did poorly in his part of the game, and I’m not getting a swelled head, either, when I say that.” Joe knew he had done good work, considering his sore arm, and he made up his mind to do still better.
The man drove along rapidly, and in about an hour had reached the outskirts of Denville. He turned down a road that was evidently little used, to judge by the grass growing in it, and halted the horse in front of a small building. It did not look like a place where inventors’ models would be made. In fact the shack had a forlorn and forsaken air about it, and Joe looked curiously at it. His suspicions were coming back.
“Where is my father?” he demanded. “I don’t see him.”
“It’s all right now—it’s all right,” said the man quickly. “Hello in there!” he called.
The next instant Joe saw a face at the window. Then it disappeared, but that momentary glance had showed him it was the face of Mr. Isaac Benjamin. In a second it was all clear to him. He had been trapped. He attempted to spring from the carriage seat.
“I’m on to your game!” he exclaimed to the man.