"Well of all things!" ejaculated Mrs. Harper. "What will you infants do next? Offer to relieve the President of his job?"
"Well, we did catch the dynamiters at the Elk City reservoir," protested Henry defensively. "And we did it after the state police and the national guards had failed. I don't see why we can't help catch German spies in New York just as well as in Pennsylvania."
"Humph!" said Mrs. Harper. "It's a lot of help you youngsters would be in catching real spies. You just happened to stumble on these dynamiters and now you think you can do thing. But that's the way with boys. They're all alike."
"But, mother," protested Henry, "boys can be useful in lots of ways. And just because they are boys nobody thinks of suspecting them."
"There's one place where a certain boy I know could be of a lot of use and never be suspected," agreed Mrs. Harper. "And that's at that woodpile back of the shed."
"Please don't interrupt me, mother," said Henry. "You asked me to tell you about our trip to New York."
"About your dream of a trip to New York," corrected Mrs. Harper. "You don't for one minute think you are really going to New York, do you?"
"Indeed we are," replied Henry. "And this is how it came about. When I read of the leak in the navy's secrets and the attempts of the Germans to torpedo our transports, I wrote to Captain Hardy about it. I told him we could be just as useful catching German spies in New York as we were in Pennsylvania. He answered and said he didn't think we could be of any use, but——"
"Showed his sense," interrupted Mrs. Harper.
"But he said," continued Henry, paying no attention to the interruption, "that he would mention the matter to the Chief of the Radio Service and let me know if anything came of it. And something has come of it, mother. Just think! We're to go. Here's the telegram itself."