“I’m coming to that. That’s the queer part,” the sergeant went on. “You see I have four sheets left. That means four possibilities.
“Since you insist, we’ll take the call that was going through when the station was raided. You’ll be surprised. That squad call was a notice that someone was breaking in over on Lake Shore Drive. Swell apartment. People all gone. When the radio failed to give the alarm, a squad was sent out from the local police station, and the burglars were caught.”
“Oh!” Johnny leaned forward expectantly.
“That’s what I thought,” grumbled the sergeant. “But they turned out to be two kids, one about twenty, the other younger. Dressed like college kids, they were, in yellow slickers decorated with hearts and kewpies; you know the sort.
“But let me tell you one thing. You may lay a bet those boys never saw the inside of any college. I’ve been watching. We don’t get many real college boys. When they’re smart enough and good enough workers to get up to college, they’re too smart to think they can beat the game by turning crooks.”
“But where did the boys come from?” Johnny asked.
“That’s what they didn’t tell,” said McCarthey. “If we knew, it might throw some light on the subject. But you can see how likely it is that a bunch of kids are going to figure out that they’ll get caught burglarizing an empty flat unless they send someone to beat up a radio announcer or two. And besides, if they did, who would they get to go for ’em? Too dangerous. Lot worse than burglarizing.
“So that,” he threw the second sheet aside, “looks like a doubtful chance. But we’ll keep ’em all.
“Another queer thing.” He turned to the third sheet. “Not many cases go out over the air. We can handle ’em other ways. Three an hour is a good many. But in that fifteen minutes when the radio station was dead, smashed to bits, there were three squad calls that did not go out, and two were mighty important.
“You know that long row of warehouses just back of your shack, Drew?” He turned to Drew Lane.