Dr. Tallman was standing on his porch the next morning. By his side was
Ralph, pale and a bit shaky, but with a glad look on his face. The news
of Jack’s safety had heartened him up immensely.
All at once, far down the road a cloud of dust showed that a vehicle of
some sort was approaching. It drew rapidly closer, and the two figures
on the porch saw that it was a fast red runabout, and carried two
persons.
The machine was the lawyer’s own, the yellow car having been taken by
the police. The next instant they were recognized as Mr. Bowler, the
lawyer, and Jack.
“I wonder where Tom is?” questioned Ralph.
The next minute, after greetings had been exchanged, Mr. Bowler and Jack
were asking the same question. Dr. Tallman looked amazed.
“Why, he left here last night for your house!” exclaimed the doctor.
“Didn’t he arrive?”
“No; we haven’t seen a sign of him. What can have happened?” exclaimed
the lawyer anxiously.
“I’ll bet those rascals are mixed up in it in some way,” cried Jack.
“Oh, what can we do to find him?”
“Wait a moment, things may not be as bad as you imagine,” said the
doctor.
The words had hardly left his lips before down the road from the
opposite direction to that from which the lawyer and Jack had arrived,
there came another automobile.
Jack recognized its familiar outlines in a flash.
“The Flying Road Racer!” he exclaimed, and then the next instant, “Tom
is in it. Hooray! Where can he have been?”
“And who is that with him?” wondered Mr. Bowler.
“Why—why—it’s a clown!” gasped Ralph, bursting into a laugh. “Why—why,”
he exclaimed a moment later, “it’s old Dick Dangler, from Sawdon’s
circus, the only man who was kind to me in that whole company; What can
he be doing with Tom?”
The Flying Road Racer swept up to the porch, and before its wheels had
stopped revolving almost, Tom and Jack were clasping each other’s hands.
Ralph, too, was dancing for joy, while, in the background, Mr. Bowler
and Dr. Tallman looked on.
Tom’s story was soon told.
“We found the auto as soon as it was daylight,” he said, “but the men
who took the model had damaged the engine so that it took me some little
time to fix it up. And that’s all, except that here we are, and the
model has slipped out of our hands for a second time.”
“Never mind,” said Dr. Tallman consolingly, “maybe you’ll find it
again.”
But Tom shook his head disconsolately.
“I guess not, it’s gone for good, I’m afraid, this time. But Dick
Dangler here has something he wants to tell you, Dr. Tallman.”
“To tell me?” said the doctor in wondering tones, looking at the
eccentric figure of the clown, who was talking apart with Ralph.
“Yes. It concerns Ralph’s identity. If I’m not mistaken, you already
suspect him to be more than a friendless orphan lad.”
“Frankly I do,” was the rejoinder. “He has a peculiar mark on his arm in
the shape of a wineglass. I never recall having seen such a peculiarity
except on one child, an infant named Ralph Melville.”
“Hurray! Glory be!” exclaimed Tom, much to the surprise of the doctor
and the lawyer, the latter of whom had started at the name of Melville.
“Ralph, you’re rich, or are going to be. It’s all the same! Hurray!”
Of course, until Dick Dangler’s story had been told the rest of the
party couldn’t make out Tom’s delight. But it appeared, according to Mr.
Bowler, that it would be a difficult matter to prove Ralph’s rights to
the Melville fortune and name, and in the meantime much had to be done.
The fact that it was Melville who was also concerned in trying to
swindle Mr. Peregrine out of his invention was another complication.
A conference was held, at which it was decided that Ralph for the
present would remain with Dr. Tallman, his father’s old friend. In the
meantime the others would go to Boston and try to get on the track of
the patent thieves. Before they departed, however, Dick Dangler was
fitted out with an old suit of the doctor’s, and proved to be quite a
respectable, kindly appearing man, with a very grave and serious
countenance. A clown would have been the last thing you’d have taken him
for.
From Boston Mr. Peregrine was fully apprised of the recent exciting
happenings, and begged the boys not to run into any unnecessary danger.
Mr. Chadwick had returned from Washington, he said, and had expressed
his desire that, as the boys had lost Mr. Peregrine’s model, they should
do all they could to find it. As for Mr. Jesson, the news from him was
that he was perfectly happy, having found a new variety of potato in the
Pokeville district.
As Mr. Bowler had a good deal of legal work to attend to, which had been
neglected during the last few days, he left the boys to their own
devices. Dick Dangler rode with them to the garage where they put tip
the Flying Road Racer, and then left them, promising to call at their
hotel later in the day.
Having seen the car put up, the two lads started out for Police
Headquarters. There they were informed that not a trace had been found
of the men who had stolen the model. Tom then related what had occurred
in the old mansion.
“So that’s where they have been hanging out!” exclaimed the official to
whom he communicated this information. “Well, I’ll send a couple of men
out there this very afternoon to search the place thoroughly. We may
light on a clew.” He went on to inform them that every station in Boston
would be guarded, and that no chance to capture the men, supposing them
to be in that city, would be neglected.
“Well, I suppose we will have to be content with that,” said Tom, as
they left. “It’s tough to think that those men may be right in the city
now and yet we can do nothing.”
“I should think it more likely that they would be in New York,” said
Jack. “After what they did in the old mansion it would be my idea that
they would try to get as far away from this vicinity as possible,
knowing that we are on their trail.”
The boys walked on through the streets, looking into shop windows, and
especially into those in which mechanical apparatus was displayed. But
this began to pall after a while, and Jack suggested that they take a
walk along the wharves. Tom readily agreed, and, arm in arm, they set
out to visit one of the most interesting quarters of the Hub.
The “T” wharf, where the fishing vessels lie, particularly attracted
their attention, and they were gazing with interest at a smart schooner
unloading her finny freight when a familiar voice struck on their ears.
“Why, hullo, boys, what are you doing here?”
They turned and found themselves gazing into the frank, bronzed face of
Captain Andrews, skipper of the yacht Sea King, who had shared their
adventures in Yucatan.
The captain was unaffectedly glad to see his young shipmates again, and
asked them many questions about themselves. He said that he had
prospered exceedingly, and now owned two fishing schooners besides a
fast, smart motor craft, all engaged in the fishing industry. He was so
eager to unfold the story of his progress that he did not at first
notice that neither of the boys looked particularly cheerful.
“What’s in the wind, shipmates?” he demanded. “You look as
down-in-the-mouth as a hooked codfish.”
“As bad as all that?” laughed Jack. “Well, Captain, there’s a reason, as
the advertisements say.”
“What’s up? Heave ahead and spin your yarn. If it’s anything I can help
you out of, trust me to do all I can.”
His manner invited confidence, and, seating themselves beside the sea
veteran on an upturned box, Jack poured out the story of their troubles.
“Well, if that don’t beat a novel!” exclaimed the captain when he had
finished. “And those two rascals are in Boston, do you think?”
“We don’t know,” rejoined Jack. “We’ve really no way of finding out, and
the police are as helpless as we are.”
“Oh, the police are always no more use than a lot of babies,” declared
Captain Andrews, who clearly had a contempt for that much-maligned body
of men. “I’d back you boys against any detective I ever saw.”
“That’s very good of you,” laughed Tom, “but I’m afraid we’ve proved the
kind of detectives that don’t detect.”
“Don’t be downcast, lads,” counselled the captain heartily. “When things
seem at the worst, it is generally the time that they begin to mend.
I’ll spin you a yarn about that, if you like.”
“I wish you would,” said Jack. “It will pass the time away pleasantly.”
“Back fifteen years ago I was mate of the brig Nancy Lee,” began the
captain. “We sailed out of ’Frisco on the Fourth of July, bound for the
islands on a trading cruise. Two days out we ran into as nasty a sample
of weather as ever I saw. We lost our mainmast, and two of the men were
killed in its fall.
“Then, when the storm had blown itself out, the captain took sick, and,
worse than that, our provisions began to get low. Things went from bad
to worse. We did not sight a sail of any kind; the men grew ugly and
mutinous. Then one night the ship took fire and——
“Dash my lee scuppers, what’s up now?” exclaimed the amazed captain, as
Jack and Tom suddenly leaped to their feet and dashed off, leaving him
in the most exciting part of his story.
“It’s those men, there they go—look!” shouted Jack, flinging back the
words as he ran.
It was indeed Jake Rook and Radcliff. They turned as they heard the boys
shout, and then, recognizing them, took to their heels. The boys ran in
and out amid the maze of traffic, and for a time kept the two rascals in
sight. But finally in the crush and crowd they lost them, and had to
admit that there was but little likelihood of their ever finding them
again.
Regretfully they retraced their steps, but on their return they found
that Captain Andrews had been called away on business, leaving word with
the men on board the schooner that he would visit them at their hotel
later in the day.
“We do seem to have the very worst sort of luck,” declared Tom, as the
two lads trudged back to their hotel in very low spirits. “If only we
could have caught up to those rascals!”
“We made a big mistake when we shouted out as we did,” said Jack. “If we
had followed them in silence we might have managed to track them to
wherever they have their hang-out.”
Tom reluctantly agreed that this was so. “But, just the same,” he added,
“we do have hard luck, and more than our fair share of it.” After lunch
they set out for Mr. Bowler’s office, having already telephoned to the
police that the men were actually in Boston. Just as they were leaving
the hotel, however, they met with an unexpected interruption to their
plans. Dick Dangler hurried up to them, his ordinarily grave face
flushed and excited.
“I’ve news!” he exclaimed. “Great news!”
“You’ve found those men?” asked Jack and Tom in the same breath.
“No; but I’ve done almost as well. Who do you suppose I’ve seen?”
“Haven’t an idea,” said Jack. “Maybe——”
“Nobody less than Sawdon, and with him was Stephen Melville himself.”
“Stephen Melville here in Boston?” gasped Jack. “He must be going to
meet Jake Rook and Radcliff.”
“I don’t know, but I did better than just seeing them. I followed them.
Traced them to an old tumble-down livery barn on Emmons Street. They are
there now, I guess. Phew! I ran all the way here to tell you, and I’m
’most out of breath.”
“Good work!” exclaimed Jack. “It looks as if the net was closing in
about those rascals. Come on, Tom, we’ll hurry to headquarters, get some
officers and go down there. We’ll bag the whole gang in a bunch.”
“That’s the idea,” cried Tom, “but, hurry up, we’ve no time to lose.
Glory be! I feel better than I have for many a day. Things are coming
our way at last.”