Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was
produced from images made available by the HathiTrust
Digital Library.)
[Illustration: They were all crouched low to avoid being seen from
the deck.]
THE RADIO BOYS ON SECRET SERVICE DUTY
By GERALD BRECKENRIDGE
Author of
"The Radio Boys on the Mexican Border," "The Radio Boys with the Revenue
Guards," "The Radio Boys' Search for the Inca's Treasure," "The Radio
Boys Rescue the Lost Alaska Expedition."
A. L. BURT COMPANY
Publishers, New York
Copyright, 1922
By A. L. BURT COMPANY
THE RADIO BOYS ON SECRET SERVICE DUTY
Made in "U. S. A."
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I--FRANK "LISTENS IN"
CHAPTER II--LOOSE ENDS OF A PLOT
CHAPTER III--THE MAN OF MYSTERY AGAIN
CHAPTER IV--ENTER INSPECTOR BURTON
CHAPTER V--THE SOUND DETECTOR
CHAPTER VI--IN THE ENEMY'S TOILS
CHAPTER VII--A BREAK FOR LIBERTY
CHAPTER VIII--CHINATOWN WINS
CHAPTER IX--THE POWER OF THE UNDERWORLD
CHAPTER X--CARRIED CAPTIVE TO SEA
CHAPTER XI--"BEST LAID PLANS"
CHAPTER XII--A STORM AT SEA
CHAPTER XIII--HOPE IS "IN THE AIR"
CHAPTER XIV--THE UPPER HAND REGAINED
CHAPTER XV--ABANDON SHIP
CHAPTER XVI--DOCTOR MARLEY EXPLAINS
CHAPTER XVII--LOST TRAIL
CHAPTER XVIII--CLOSING IN
CHAPTER XIX--THE SOUND DETECTOR DETECTS
CHAPTER XX--IN AT THE DEATH
CHAPTER XXI--AT SANTA CRUZ ISLAND
CHAPTER XXII--IN THE SMUGGLERS' COVE
CHAPTER XXIII--A SIGNAL FROM THE RADIO STATION
CHAPTER XXIV--A SPY CAPTURED
CHAPTER XXV--A FORLORN HOPE
CHAPTER XXVI--A SURPRISE ATTACK
CHAPTER XXVII--BLACK GEORGE CAPTURED
CHAPTER XXVIII--REWARDS AHEAD
CHAPTER XXIX--A LOOK INTO THE FUTURE
CHAPTER I--FRANK "LISTENS IN"
"Excuse me for butting in, stranger," said a pleasant voice at the door
of the Pullman stateroom, "but I heard you talkin' to these boys about
the old mining camps in these California mountains. It's kind of
tiresome with nobody to talk to, ridin' all day. Mind if I come in?
Mebbe I can tell you some things interesting to easterners. I'm an
old-timer here."
"Come right in," said Mr. Temple, rising and extending his hand. "My
name's Temple, George Temple. And this is my son, Bob, and his chums,
Jack Hampton and Frank Merrick."
"My name's Harlan, Ed Harlan," said the other, advancing. "I was born
and raised in the mountains. My dad was a forty-niner from Tennessee."
He was a slim middle-aged man in black, with a black sombrero worn at a
rakish angle.
Those who have read _The Radio Boys on the Mexican Border_ are familiar
with Mr. Temple and the three chums. Living in country homes on the far
end of Long Island, they had been drawn by a web of circumstances into
international intrigue on the Mexican Border. Jack's father,
representative of a syndicate of independent oil operators, had been
kidnapped by Mexican rebels seeking to embroil the government with that
of the United States. The boys had gone into Mexico and rescued him. Now
Mr. Temple, a New York importer, was making a business trip to San
Francisco and taking them with him.
Radio had played no unimportant part in their adventures. In fact, it
had been instrumental in bringing them to a successful conclusion. It
was Mr. Hampton, a scientific man enthusiastic over the development of
radio telephony long before the craze swept the country, who had
introduced the boys to it. He was licensed by the government to build a
transmission station on his Long Island estate and use an 1,800-metre
wave length for trans-oceanic experiment. When he went to the
Southwestern oil fields, he also erected a station there, using the same
wave length previously assigned him.
These two stations not only provided exceptional opportunities for the
boys to learn the intricacies of radio telephony but also provided a
method of helping defeat the ends sought by the Mexican rebels. In their
invasion of Mexico, moreover, the boys found several radio stations
which were links in a chain that had been built by German spies
operating in Mexico against the United States during the World War.
Frank and Bob also owned an all-metal airplane outfitted with radio,
which had played a leading role in their Mexican border adventure. Frank
was an orphan living with the Temples. Bob's mother was dead. The two
estates of Mr. Hampton and Mr. Temple adjoined. Jack, the oldest of the
trio, was 19, while Frank and Bob were a year younger, Frank being the
youngest of the three. All attended Harrington Hall Military Academy,
and were on their summer vacation when the Mexican border adventures
immediately preceding these about to be recorded occurred.
On their way to San Francisco the party had gone by a circuitous route
through Denver in order to visit the Mile High City of the Rockies. They
were now on the last day of their journey and passing through the
Sierras down the famous Feather River Canyon.
Accompanied by Mr. Harlan the group made its way to the observation
platform on the rear of the Flyer. Hour after hour they sat there while
the scenery about them gradually changed its character with the passing
of the afternoon, the mountains giving way to foothills and seeming to
recede farther and farther to the rear. In reality, of course, the train
was drawing away from them and descending into the lower ranges.
Harlan was a pleasant companion, and from him the boys learned more
intimate history of California than they ever had been able to obtain
from textbooks. He told them of the days of '49 and the treasure
seekers; how the latter had come overland by wagon trails in some cases,
fighting Indians and starvation, leaving many in nameless graves by the
wayside during the long trek across the desert and through the
mountains; how, in other cases, the adventurers had sailed in
windjammers, or ships propelled by sails alone and without engine power,
spending as much as a year in the long trip from the eastern seaboard
clear around South America and Cape Horn, although the majority had
sailed merely to the Isthmus of Panama and crossing by horseback or in
wagons, had taken ship on the other side for San Francisco.
"Those were the days," said Harlan. "Of course, I didn't experience them
personally, for I'm just a young man now. But my father was a
forty-niner, came out from Tennessee. And the stories he used to tell of
San Francisco in the early days made me mad because I hadn't lived there
then.
"She was just a crazy little town of crazy little wooden shacks, built
any whichway over the hills, but the people that built her were the
hardy spirits of all the world and the breath of romance must have been
in the very air."
At a question from Frank, who, like his chums, was intensely interested
in these stories of early California, Mr. Harlan launched into a
description of the Spanish Dons inhabiting the land before the invasion
of the gold seekers.
Mexico, he recalled to the boys, used to own California. The best
Spanish families lived there on grants of land from the King of Spain
which had been passed down from generation to generation.
The estates were huge, and the Dons lived on them pretty much absolute
masters of their Indians and peons. It was an easy, gracious sort of
existence, without hurry, without the bustle and haste introduced later
by the Americans with their multifarious machinery. If the Don stirred
abroad, he rode a mount jingling with fanciful and costly trappings, and
he himself dressed like a cavalier of old. At night his hacienda would
resound to music while the gentry from miles around danced and their
carriages and horses filled his ample stables and stood under the
drooping pepper trees.
Then came the gold seekers scarring the hills of the northern part of
the state with their mines. And in their wake came the farmers and
ranchers with their new-fangled farm machinery. They took the rich
valleys where the countless herds of the Dons had roamed in the past,
and began making that marvelous soil produce crops of wheat. The old
order with its lazy ways could not survive before the new day with its
energy and modern business methods. The Dons went to the wall.
"To-day," said Harlan, in his drawling southern voice, "there are some
of their descendants left. But they cut little figure in the present-day
California."
Jack spoke up with unexpected heat.
"Well, I think it's a shame," he said. "I know that we are supposed to
believe our own ways of living are the best, but I, for one, wish
California had stayed the way it was."
Bob leaned toward Frank and assumed a confidential tone.
"He's thinking of Senorita Rafaela," he said.
She was the daughter of Don Fernandez y Calomares, a wealthy Mexican of
pure Castilian descent living in a palace in northern Mexico. The Don
was leader of the Mexican rebels who, as related in _The Radio Boys on
the Mexican Border_, had captured Mr. Hampton. Jack and Bob in the
latter's airplane had gone to the rescue, and the young Spanish girl had
given them valuable aid.
At Bob's words, which although low spoken were intended to reach Jack's
ear, the latter flushed. Then he reached over and pulling Bob's cap down
over his eyes started to shake him good-naturedly. In a moment all three
boys were entangled. Mr. Temple laughed and explained the situation to
Mr. Harlan. The two men watched the chums amusedly, until a sudden lurch
as the train whirled around a sharp curve threatened to send Jack flying
overboard.
With a quick movement Mr. Harlan seized Jack by the coat and pulled him
back to safety.
"That was a close call," said Mr. Temple gravely. "You boys ought to be
more careful."
At Oroville, which he explained was in the heart of the apple country,
Mr. Harlan left the party. All were sorry to bid him farewell, for he
had been a jolly and informative companion. Dinner was served, and the
party returned to the club car where Mr. Temple settled down with his
cigar and a newspaper. Presently the chums grew tired of reading, and
once more sauntered out to the observation platform.
They would not sleep aboard the train again as they would reach their
destination near midnight. For a time they gossiped in low voices, so as
not to disturb two men whispering together on the other side of the
platform. All three sat in silence, slumped down in their chairs and at
first staring out at the landscape bathed in magical moonlight.
Gradually Jack and Bob yielded to the soporific influences of their
surroundings, with the car wheels beating a monotonous and
sleep-inducing lullaby.
Presently the two men who had been whispering raised their voices
slightly in argument. Then one ceased abruptly, cast a keen glance
toward the boys, said a word or two in a low voice to his companion, and
they arose and entered the car. Frank, who like his companions had been
sitting with his cap pulled down over his eyes, had not been asleep,
however, and as the others left the platform he shook Jack and Bob into
wakefulness.
"Did you hear that?" he demanded excitedly.
His two chums rubbed their eyes, and looked puzzled.
"Hear what?" asked Jack.
"What those fellows said."
"What fellows?" asked Bob.
"Why, those two men who were out here," Frank said impatiently. "I
believe you were actually asleep."
"Guess I was," said Bob, yawning. "But what was it they said? And were
they talking to you?"
"They were whispering to each other," said Frank. "I didn't mean to
listen. But they raised their voices, and I overheard. Then one of them
looked our way--to see if we heard, I suppose--and they got up and left."
"Well, what was it?" demanded Jack.
"Shh," said Frank, nervously. "The door's open and that man--the one that
got suspicious of us--is staring out at us. Listen," he whispered, "I'm
going in to talk to Uncle George. You fellows stretch and yawn presently
and get up and go to our stateroom. Then pretty soon I'll bring Uncle
George in, and we can shut the door and I'll tell you."