Karl motioned him aside after breakfast.
"What did you mean?" he asked.
"That I've an idea. Just listen;" and a great many questions and answers were exchanged in a hurried undertone.
"Grand—if it will work. Then we must be all ready by the time he comes down stairs?"
"Yes, and before that send a telegram to the boys."
"The boys" meant Hal and Jack Putnam; "a telegram," a note pinned to the string that went round a wooden peg at one of the Budgett windows, and another at the Putnams'.
"Why?" queried Karl.
"You'll see," replied Rick, as he hastily pencilled:
"'Be on the look-out for Uncle Budge. B. S.'"
The telegram came as the Putnam boys were breakfasting, and Jack laughed as he read it aloud.