It was a fine parade from start to finish. A number of ex-service men led the van, with the town organizations following. They made up fully one-half of the parade and then came the Woodcrest Military Institute corps. Afterward, everyone gave praise to the young soldiers from the school up in the hills. The cavalry was superb, the infantry marched with precision, every foot in step and every white glove swinging with accuracy, the flags drooping colorfully and the young men erect. The field guns rolled along looking grim and effective, and when the parade finally came to an end the colonel was more than satisfied.
In the afternoon the pageant was held and the cadets, no longer under orders, watched the display. Fortunately, the Gannon House stood back from the street and was favored with wide lawns, and the people who came to see the spectacle, and that included practically the entire town, were all able to see the display. Actors dressed in the costumes of Revolutionary times took part and it proved to be most entertaining. A young man came to the door of the Gannon House, dressed in the Colonial costume, and asked for lodging, explaining that he was a teacher and wanted to earn his living in the town. He was graciously received by the Gannon family and installed as one of the family. But no sooner had this young man settled himself than he began to entertain strange visitors. Very erect men visited him, listening to his low-spoken talk with great attention and then going away. At night the teacher left the house, wrapped in a great cloak, explaining to Mr. Gannon, who asked his purpose, that he was merely walking for exercise and recreation. Then came two patriots who pretended great friendship for the young teacher and watched him at night, crouching beneath the windows to do so. Toward the end of the pageant they unmasked the spy and Mr. Gannon was the first to condemn him to the fate of hanging. The last scene showed the Gannon family hearing from the lips of American officers that no more information was “leaking” to the British.
The pageant was well given and the spectators enjoyed it. Gates’ house was then opened to the public for a supper, which was served to the members of the committee. At eight o’clock the doors were formally opened to the general public, and Jim took his post at the back door.
Hudson, as senior captain of the corps, occupied the central position at the front door. Other captains and lieutenants had posts throughout the house. There were two cadets on the lower floor, one in the center of the house and another in the huge, Colonial kitchen, a cadet on the central staircase and one on the landing of the second floor. One cadet stood post on the third floor, where the quarters of the servants still stood unchanged since the days of the building of the house. And at the back door stood Jim.
He was not sure that his post was the best in the world, but he did have an active one. Early in the evening numbers of townsfolk, some of them brilliantly dressed, entered the house and were led through it by members of the Daughters of the American Revolution, who were all dressed in costumes of that period. When they finished inspecting the house they went to the grounds in the back and kept Jim active. When he heard a step on the other side of the door he would step quickly to the door, open it wide and step back, holding it open until the persons had passed through and then closing it. The yard had been lighted only in the immediate vicinity of the house. The back gardens remained in darkness.
Of course much was seen of the Gates family. Melvin Gates, who had recovered from his accident, was everywhere in evidence, easily the center of the affair. A few knew that the senior Gates was more than delighted at the entire circumstance, as it was raising him vastly in the eyes of the townspeople in general. He had not himself offered his house for inspection, but had been very willing when the subject had been broached to him by the leaders of the movement. Arthur Gates was also much in the public eye as he moved with immense sociability around the house, his wife beside him, bowing and smiling. When the party happened to be composed of persons of wealth and distinction in Portville the bow and the smile became very genial indeed.
However, not only the rich and influential came that night to the old Gannon House, but also the poor and humble. Many a plain working man, interested in the history of his country or the structure of the house, came to look through it and Jim opened the door to such as well as to the others who swept by him with a swish of costly garments. To all of them Jim extended the same unfailing courtesy.
Toward nine o’clock in the evening a man who looked to be a laborer passed out of the back door and went into the garden. Jim noted that the man looked at his watch and then seemed to be waiting. After a time he went down to the gardens, losing himself in the blackness beyond the electric lights.
Not fifteen minutes after he had gone there was another step inside the kitchen and Jim quickly opened the door. Arthur Gates stepped out, looked all around him without paying any attention to Jim, and then set off at a rapid pace for the garden, following the same direction taken by the man. Jim was curious at once.
“I’d like to know what is going on,” he reflected. “I wonder if I ought to go down and see? Very few people are coming through any more, and besides, if I do leave my post, it will be thought I did so to run an errand. I guess I’ll take a chance on it.”
Seeing that no one was about Jim slipped quickly to the side of the yard and away from the glare of the lights. Then, following a path which wound down into the farther reaches of the place he moved forward, treading with infinite care, avoiding gravelled walks where possible and fairly creeping over them when they could not be avoided. In a short time he reached the garden and saw ahead of him in the darkness two forms.
A screen of bushes loomed between him and the two men and Jim crouched as he made his way to them. Once in their shelter he was able to hear plainly what was being said.
“—close against the back wall,” Gates was saying.
“You want me to mark the spot so you’ll know the place?” the man asked.
“No,” replied Gates. “I don’t care if I never see it again.”
“Not valuable, eh?” the man asked, cautiously.
“No, only a trinket I won at school, but I’m sick and tired of having it around. It is better off buried. But never mind that; all you have to do is to bury the thing. I don’t want it done by daylight, either. Will you do it tomorrow night?”
“Sure, around ten o’clock. I got to work up until that time. Right here will be all right eh?” the laborer said.
“Yes. I’ll pay you well for it, but you are to keep your mouth shut. Good heavens! this thing you’re to bury isn’t worth a dollar, and yet I’ve had more trouble with it than if it cost a thousand. Now, let’s get back and you be sure to go to work tomorrow night.”
With that they separated and Jim could see them going toward the house, but the laborer branched off and left the grounds while Arthur Gates went in the back door. Before he went to his post again Jim looked carefully around the garden where he stood. There was a high wall nearby and he knew that he was at the end of the property.
Then he went back to his post, taking care to approach it from the side of the house, casually and as though he was coming from an errand. Once more he took up his post at the back door.
“So Gates is going to bury the cup?” he reflected. “And it had given as much trouble as though it cost a thousand dollars. Of course, it may not be the cup, after all, but I’ll bet it is. Well, we’ll just dig it up as soon as he gets it planted!”
In another hour all inspection of the Gannon House was over and it once more became simply the home of the Gates family. The cadets on post assembled and marched up to the school reporting in from duty, and soon after that Jim was relating his remarkable story to Don and Terry.
“This must be the place!”
Jim whispered it cautiously and the two shadows with him nodded silently. Don and Terry crouched down beside him behind the high wall which ran back of the home of Arthur Gates.
It was on the following night, and three cadets were there with the full permission of Colonel Morrell. Jim, after his talk with his friends, had gone straight to the headmaster with the story. The colonel had also been of the opinion that it was the cup that Gates planned to bury. He agreed that it would be best for them to watch the digging and to get the object at once, before the time elapsing would give the ground a chance to freeze. So the three cadets crouched behind the wall bordering Gates’ place on this February night.
“You think this is the right spot?” Don whispered.
“Yes,” returned Jim. “What time is it?”
Terry consulted a watch with a lighted dial. “Just five minutes of ten,” he replied. “We got here just in time.”
They had reached the property a few minutes before and had skirted the wall, halting at the place which Jim had believed to be opposite the spot where Gates and the man had conferred on the previous night. They straightened up and Jim reached upward, finding that he was just able to place his fingertips on the top of the wall.
“Give me a boost up,” he ordered.
Don cupped his hand and by the aid of this step Jim sprang onto the wall. For a moment there was silence as he peered down into the garden inside, and then he leaned toward them.
“This is the place,” he whispered. “Come on up.”
Terry formed the step by which Don joined his brother on the wall and then they both pulled the red-head up. Jim then looked carefully back of him.
“There are no lights back of us,” he said. “I’m pretty sure that no one can see us.”
They settled themselves to wait and the minutes dragged by. It seemed an age, though it was in reality only fifteen minutes when Terry hissed warningly.
“Somebody is coming!”
They crouched low as they saw a bobbing light coming down the path toward them. It was a man with a lantern and as he drew nearer they saw that it was a short man, whom Jim recognized as the man who had talked with Gates. Near the wall the man halted, and placed a wooden box on the ground. Setting the lantern down, and without looking around him, he dropped a pick and shovel from his shoulder. He took up the pick, raised it above his head and brought it down with a thump on the hard earth.
The boys, when talking the situation over at school, were agreed that Gates had received his idea from the newspaper account of the burying of the silver plate by the Gannon family. When they saw the wooden box on the ground they were firmly convinced that it held the disputed silver cup, for it was just the right size.
The digger in the garden worked steadily at his task, breaking the stiff earth with his pick and then shovelling it away with his shovel. He had made a hole perhaps three feet deep when something wholly unexpected happened.
There was a sudden flash of fire back of the watching cadets and they were bathed in an embarrassing glow of light. Turning startled heads over their shoulders they saw that a garage nearby had caught fire and that a pan of oil was blazing up to the sky. The man working in the garden looked up with a grunt of fright, but fortunately not in their immediate direction, for the glare was spreading and he looked slightly to one side of them. Seeing how things stood the three cadets dropped from the wall swiftly and with as little noise as possible, crouching at the bottom of the wall outside Gates’ property. The glare died down abruptly.
“Did he see us?” questioned Don, eagerly.
“No,” whispered Jim. “But that was a narrow escape.”
“You bet,” agreed Terry. “There we were, sitting on the wall like three chickens! That was a lucky escape.”
“We had better wait here until he finishes his digging,” Jim suggested. “Listen; he has gone back to work.”
They could hear the man resume his digging. But it was unfortunate that they could not see into the garden, for real trouble was coming their way rapidly.
Arthur Gates, uneasy over the affair, had been standing at an upper window when the flare had illuminated the sky, and clearly and distinctly he had seen the three cadets on the wall. Uttering an exclamation the man ran from the house and made his way to the digger. Unknown to the boys a rapid interchange of words followed and then Gates took up the box and went back to the house. The man who was doing the digging dropped his shovel and waited a moment, until he was joined by the caretaker of the property. Some whispering passed between them and then they silently made their way to a gate in the wall.
The three cadets crouched there in the blackness of the night beside the wall and waited. They strained their ears to hear continued sounds of the digging but they heard nothing.
“He must be finished,” Terry whispered.
“I should think that we would hear him replacing the dirt,” suggested Jim.
“Suppose you go aloft and see?” said Don, in a low voice.
Jim straightened up and Don gave him a hand to the top of the wall. Once there Jim peered carefully over to see how far the man had gotten in his work. But in a moment he was down again.
“The man is gone!” he told them, in wonder.
“Then he has finished,” concluded Don, but Jim shook his head.
“I don’t know why he should be. The lantern is still there and the hole is open, but the box is gone!”
“Gone?” the others cried guardedly.
“Yes, and I don’t see a sign of the man,” Jim replied.
“Let me take a look,” Don directed briefly.
When he had been hoisted up he made the same observation that Jim had. The three boys were puzzled.
“Confound that fire!” growled Terry. “If it hadn’t been for that we would know what was going on.”
“It doesn’t look very good to me,” observed Jim.
They waited for a moment, undecided as to what to do. The only sound that reached their ears was the sound of men in the nearby garage, who had put out the unexpected fire and who were talking about it. They were not near enough to cause the cadets any misgivings, however.
“Give me another boost,” said Don, but Jim caught his arm in a firm grasp.
“Listen!” commanded his brother.
There had been a faint sound near them, along the wall, the sound as of a small stick breaking. There was no further noise but they had heard that one plainly. A suspicion leaped into Don’s mind.
“Maybe someone saw us and they are after us,” he whispered.
No sooner had he spoken than two distinct shadows loomed up before them along the wall.
“Run, you guys!” cried Jim.
They dashed away from the wall as fast as they could go toward the open field, the two men hard at their heels. Jim and Terry were slightly ahead of Don and running swiftly, breaking their way recklessly through the bushes that barred their way. Don had been a bit slower but was sufficiently ahead of his pursuers to keep him out of danger. They ran in the general direction of the school, trusting to luck to keep them out of holes and other pitfalls.
But Don was the unlucky one. Jim and Terry veered to the right across the fields but Don kept on going, failing to follow their lead closely. When he noticed that they had changed their course he swung around to follow them. There was nothing ahead of him, but as he ran forward he felt himself flung back abruptly, to tumble breathless to the ground. Before him was a long chicken run, with high chicken wire strung from pole to pole to pole, and Don had run against this net in the dark, to be playfully tossed for a considerable loss.
It proved to be a fatal loss. Just as he scrambled to his feet the two men swooped down on him and two pairs of strong arms gripped him. He struggled but the men held him fast.
“Let go of me,” he demanded, somewhat breathlessly.
“Nothing doing, bub,” growled the man who had been digging. “You come along with us.”
“Where are you taking me?” Don asked, as they led him along.
“Back to the house,” replied the other, an older man. “We want to find out what you were doing snooping around there. I’m caretaker at the house and I can have you arrested for trespassing.”
Don had a pretty fair idea that Arthur Gates would not have him arrested but he realized that he was in a tough spot.
There was nothing more said until they reached the house, where Don was quickly ushered into the presence of Arthur Gates. The man was seated in the library when they entered, with a book in his hand, and he looked up in apparent surprise when Don was brought in.
“What is this, Garry?” he asked of the caretaker.
“Caught this fellow trespassing on the grounds, sir,” said the caretaker.
“You did not!” denied Don. “You caught me way over in the next field.”
“But you must have been on the grounds, in order for Garry to have seen you,” declared Gates, putting his book down. He looked keenly at Don. “Why, you are one of the cadets from Woodcrest, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” nodded Don. “I am.”
“What are you doing out at this late hour?” asked Gates. “Taking French leave, I suppose?”
“Yes,” said Don, seeing his course.
“You should be in bed by this time at the school,” Gates went on. “What were you doing on my property?”
“I haven’t been on your property yet,” said Don.
“The wall is my property,” flashed Gates.
“Oh, so you saw me on the wall?” questioned Don.
Gates bit his lip. He had not intended to say so much. “Never mind who saw you there; you were there.” He turned to the other two. “You may go now.” To the laborer he said: “I won’t need you any more tonight, Tom. Drop around to see me in the morning.”
The two men went out and Gates turned to Don once more. “Now, young man, what is your name?”
“Mercer,” replied Don.
“What were you snooping around here for tonight, Mercer?”
“Three of us were out on a lark and we looked over your wall on the way back,” replied Don.
“You were sitting on the wall,” accused Gates.
“Yes, we sat on the wall,” confessed Don. “But we didn’t trespass on your property and so you can’t hold us. All you can do is report us to the colonel.”
“I think you were prowling around here for something else, young man,” growled Gates, rising.
“What for?” asked Don, looking straight into Gates’ eyes.
“How should I know?” the man evaded. “I’m going to take you into custody for a time at least, Mercer. You come with me.”
“Where are you taking me?” Don asked, as Gates took hold of his arm.
“Never mind asking so many questions, but come along. Don’t make any resistance or I shall call in the police. By the way, aren’t you one of those cadets who brought in my father from that accident?”
“Yes,” acknowledged Don.
“Too bad you had to mix yourself up in this business.”
“What business are you talking about?” asked Don pointedly.
“Never mind that. What became of your companions?”
“I suppose they got away.”
“Well, I’ll find out who they were and have them punished, too. Now, out this way.”
Curiously Don followed his captor out into the hall and up the big staircase to the second floor, down that hall and up a flight of stairs to the third floor. Coming to a door there Gates opened it and thrust Don inside, closing the door after him. A moment later and Don heard a key rattle in the lock. Then the sound of rapidly retreating footsteps came to his ears.
He attempted to move around the room and bumped into something sharp that poked into his waist. Striking a match that he found in his pocket, Don saw that he was in a billiard room and that he had bumped the table. Seeing a light switch on the wall he moved toward it and turned on the lights. Then he looked curiously around his prison.
There were no windows in the room, but a skylight gave it illumination in the daytime. If necessary Don was sure that he could jump from the table to the skylight and make his way to the roof, but he had no intention of trying it at present. Instead, he went to the door and tried it carefully, finding it locked.
“They won’t keep me in here long,” he thought grimly. “I’ll raise such a racket that he’ll be glad to let me out. But I wonder if that will be the best thing to do?”
He began to shake the door, to try its strength, and at last pressed against the lock with all his strength. Although that had no effect on the lock directly it had an unexpected outcome. There was a step out in the hall, and the key was turned in the lock. When the door was thrown open Don stared into the face of a butler.
He was the first one to recover himself. “Oh, thanks a lot for opening the door,” he said, carelessly, seeing his way out. “Someone must have turned the key in the lock.”
“But what—who are you, sir?” the surprised butler stammered.
“I’m an acquaintance of Mr. Gates,” said Don. “I came up here with him and he left me to go down stairs. Someone must have turned the lock while I was in here.”
“But, sir,” protested the butler. “No one has been past this door. I sleep in the next room and I came out before going to bed because I heard you rattle the door.”
“And that was very kind of you,” said Don. He saw that the butler was not overly bright and that he would probably have no trouble with the man. “It must have been an accident, my getting locked in here. Well, I’ll go downstairs and join Mr. Gates. Thank you very much.”
“You are very welcome, sir. But—”
“But what?” inquired Don, frowning at the man. “Do you think I am a burglar, man? Can’t you see the uniform I have on? I’m a cadet at Woodcrest School.”
“No offense meant, sir,” hastily replied the butler. “It was just—hum—irregular, sir, and I wondered. Goodnight, sir.”
“Goodnight,” responded Don, hoping that Gates had not heard the talking.
Apparently he had not, for there was no movement as he walked cautiously down to the second floor. The butler had gone back to his room and no one was in the hall. The young cadet was undecided as to what to do now that he was free.
“I ought to make a good effort to get hold of that cup, now that I am in the house,” he reasoned. “But I don’t know how to go about it.”
He tiptoed along the second floor hall, determined to go to the lower floor and look around down there for the cup. He was not greatly worried about the whole situation for he knew that the colonel was back of him in whatever he did, and even in the event that the Gates family got highhanded about things he was sure that the significant word spoken to them would serve to cool their temper. So he had some degree of comfort in the fact that it would probably come out right in the end. And when he stopped to think of the heavy injustice that George Long had suffered all these years because of the flagrant villainy of these same people he had no scruples against prowling around Gates’ house.
A light showed under the door of the room into which the cadets had carried Melvin Gates the night of the accident and Don stopped there, struck by an idea. He moved up close to the door and listened, being rewarded by the murmur of voices inside. Although they were pitched in a low key he was nevertheless able to make out what was being said.
“But you cannot keep that young man a prisoner,” he heard Melvin Gates say.
“Well, what am I going to do with him?” his son asked impatiently.
“I do not know, Arthur. You think he was prowling around to find that cup?”
“Oh, of course!” cried the son, wearily. “That cup has cost me more anxiety than anything I ever had anything to do with in my life!”
“That is entirely your own fault, Arthur. If you had not been so dishonest all of your life you wouldn’t be in such a fix.”
“Don’t preach to me, father,” snapped the son, angrily.
“It is too bad I didn’t preach to you when you were smaller, instead of filling your pockets with money that you didn’t have the sense to take care of. Where is the cup now?”
“I threw it in the closet in my study, at the end of the hall,” was the answer, which sent a thrill of hope through Don.
There was a rustle inside the room, much as though someone was getting out of bed. “Tomorrow we’ll dispose of that cup by melting it in the furnace,” said the elder Gates. “Wait until I get a bathrobe on and we’ll go up and interview that young man in the billiard room.”
Don waited to hear no more. Arthur Gates had given him the clue he needed and like a shot he darted off down the hall to the room at the end. This was the room which tallied with the brief description the man had given, but Don poked his head carefully in the door before entering, as he did not wish to walk into anyone’s bedroom.
But it was a small study which lay before him. In the dim light which flooded in from the hall he could see the outline of a table, an easy chair and a pile of books on the table. On the other side of the room he made out a door. He entered the room and made his way to it, finding it slightly open. At that moment he heard the two Gates leave the room of the older man and begin to mount the stairs to the third floor.
Don’s groping hands encountered a wooden box on the floor of the closet. It seemed to be the same size as the one which had been in the garden that night, and as there was no other object on the floor or on the single shelf he was sure that he had at last come across the 1933 class trophy.
“I’ve got the cup at last,” he reflected. “Now, the big job is to get out of this house!”
Terry and Jim ran with all the speed they could muster across the fields, believing that Don was close behind them.
But Jim finally realized that no one was close to them and he came to a halt, calling to Terry in a low tone. The red-headed boy stopped and joined him.
“Did we lose our pursuers?” Terry panted.
“Yes,” gasped Jim, gulping in the fresh air. “And I’m afraid that we have lost Don!”
“Isn’t he around?” cried Terry.
“No. I don’t know what has happened to him. I heard him pounding along after us and then I lost the sound. Maybe he just branched off in another direction.”
“Let’s give him the old signal,” urged Terry, puckering up his lips. He whistled in a low, penetrating note, the signal which had always been known to the three friends and which had been agreed upon before they had left on their night’s quest. The sound went across the fields but there was no answer, though they strained their ears to listen.
“I wonder if those men caught Don?” said Jim.
“Oh, I don’t think so,” reassured Terry. “I guess he just got separated from us. Before we came out we agreed to meet under the lamp post in case we got separated. Let’s go over to the street and see if he is waiting there.”
Together they crossed the lots and emerged on the street upon which the Gannon House faced, approaching the lamp light with some degree of caution. But after they had waited in the shadow of a tree for ten minutes they were both forced to the same conclusion.
“Not a doubt in the world that he was captured,” sighed Terry.
“I’m afraid so,” agreed Jim. “If he had gone off in another direction he would surely have come here directly. At this moment he must be a prisoner in Gates’ house.”
“What are we going to do about it?” demanded Terry practically.
“What can we do?” asked Jim helplessly.
“I think we need a little direct action,” said Terry. “Let’s go back to the house and see if we can get a look at him. We may even be able to set him free.”
“OK, I’m willing,” responded Jim, moving off down the street. “Perhaps they have turned him over to the police.”
“That isn’t likely to do them any good,” explained Terry. “We have the colonel back of us and have nothing to worry about. Anyway, I think that Don will drop a word or two that will give ’em something to think about.”
“Take it easy now,” warned Jim, as they drew close to the gate before the big house. “No telling who is snooping around the grounds.”
Seeing no one in immediate range of vision they flitted across the sidewalk and entered the grounds of the old place. Keeping close to the hedge they made their way along it up to the house and then paused.
“Lights are none too plentiful in the house,” whispered Terry.
There was only one lighted room in the downstairs. A low light burned in a bedroom on the second floor and two rooms were lighted on the third floor. With one accord, after a hasty glance around, the two cadets crept to the window and looked under the shade into the library.
“No one in there,” Jim whispered.
The room was empty. A single reading lamp burned in the place but there was no sign of life. At that moment Terry nudged his companion’s arm.
“Say! Doesn’t something occur to you?”
“No,” said Jim. “What?”
“It was under this same window that the patriots stood and saw that spy school teacher talking with British officers!”
“Gee, that’s right,” mused Jim. “But we have one consolation. The Gates’ won’t take Don out and hang him!”
“No,” agreed Terry, with a half chuckle. “But they’ll want to do it to us if they catch us around here.”
“You missed your cue,” grinned Jim. “You should have said that we are doing all the hanging around here!”
“Oof! Bad pun,” snorted Terry. “But what are we going to do now?”
“Golly, I don’t know,” admitted Jim. “There is no question that Don is in the house, and that we have got to get in and rescue him. But how the devil are we to do it?”
“Don’t know how many of my ancestors were burglars!” said Terry, grimly. “But let’s see how we stand in regard to windows.”
He reached up and pushed on the frame of the window but found that it was locked. He tried another with the same result.
“Careless people!” he grunted. “Leave their windows locked every night!”
“Perhaps we can find one open on the other side of the house,” suggested Jim. “Suppose we take a look.”
They passed around the back of the house, but just as Jim turned the corner of the kitchen pantry he stopped and crouched down, pulling his companion with him.
“What’s up?” Terry whispered.
“Caretaker prowling around,” returned Jim. “Keep still, he’s coming this way.”
The form of a man loomed up before them and they held their breath as the man passed within five feet of them. When he had turned the corner of the house back of them they breathed in relief.
“Narrow escape, that,” commented Chucklehead.
“Yeah,” agreed Jim. “Well, I guess he has gone around to the other side of the house. Lucky thing he didn’t come and catch us under the window. Let’s look this side over before he returns.”
They crept along the side of the house, examining windows and testing them, but they were all firm. At last the two friends drew back under a tree.
“It’s no use,” groaned Jim. “We can’t get into the house.”
“It would be a rough joke on us if Don wasn’t in there, after all,” commented the disappointed Terry.
“But he must be. Too bad we can’t get at the second floor windows. Surely a bedroom window must be open.”
“No doubt. But who wants to climb into a bedroom, to have a lady yell blue murder or get shot at?”
“I hope it wouldn’t be as bad as all that. Say! This tree arches right over that porch roof!”
Jim had been looking up into the branches of the tree thoughtfully and now his friend followed his gaze. He saw that the tree, which grew so close to the house, extended at least two strong limbs a few feet over the roof of the porch shelter.
“There isn’t any reason why we shouldn’t climb this tree and drop onto the roof,” Terry said. “There are four windows that we can reach.”
“Yes, and the roof can’t be seen from the street,” Jim pointed out. “Think we had better go to it?”
“Yes, I do. The trunk of the tree isn’t so big that we can’t climb it. But I’m afraid that we’ll get our uniforms fearfully dirty, because we’ll have to take off our overcoats to climb.”
“Bother the uniforms!” cried Jim, impatiently. “We can have them cleaned. I’m going up.”
“Wait until I take a look around, to see if the gentleman is still taking a walk,” suggested Terry. “Stay here and keep close to the tree until I get back.”
With this final word the red-head glided off into the darkness and was lost to Jim’s sight. Two or three minutes passed, and Jim was just growing restless, when young Mr. Mackson rejoined him.
“Coast is clear,” he informed him. “The caretaker is around on the other side and just bound for the back garden. I don’t think we’ll be troubled with him. So here goes my overcoat.”
Without wasting further time the cadets slipped out of their heavy coats and Terry dropped his carelessly on the ground nearby. But Jim shook his head at that.
“Don’t leave the coats lying around here,” he warned. “That fellow may be back at any time, and we don’t want him to find the coats while we are up aloft.”
“Good head you have, Jimmie boy,” approved Terry. “Never thought it of you. Let’s park them behind these bushes, close to the porch.”
When the two boys had stowed the overcoats away so that there was no likely chance that they would be found, they returned to the foot of the tree and Terry gave Jim a boost as far up the tapering trunk as he could. From his shoulders Jim began his climb and stuck doggedly to it until he reached a small limb below the level of the tin roof. Then he called down for Terry to follow him.
His friend had a much harder job of it because he had to start from the ground but he moved slowly and surely upward. It was some years since Terry had “shinnied” up a tree and he found it hard work, but, resting at intervals, he soon joined Jim at the small limb. Without words they moved on, and before long wormed their way out on a limb that hung suspended over the roof.
“Be awfully careful when you drop on that roof,” whispered Jim. “Try to land on your toes and don’t thump if you can help it.”
Jim then swung down under the limb, hanging by his hands, and measured the distance to the roof. It was a matter of less than a foot, he discovered, and with his toes pointing downward he let go and dropped. There was scarcely a sound as he landed.
“Come on,” he whispered.
Terry swung down under the limb and after a moment of steadying himself dropped to the roof. Jim steadied him as he landed and they stood together on the tin surface and looked around.
“Hooray, a partially opened window!” breathed Jim.
Close to them a window had been left open some few inches and they made their way to it quietly. Both of them felt a tingle of excitement.
“We’ll want to get into the upper hall, if possible,” said Terry, guardedly. “Let’s hope this isn’t a bedroom. What does it look like?”
Jim was in the lead and he peered into the room, finally raising the window noiselessly in order to see better. He turned to his waiting friend.
“It doesn’t seem to be a bedroom,” he informed him. “Looks more like some kind of a study. I can see a table and an armchair, and a little light comes in from the hall. I guess this is just the kind of a room we are looking for.”
“Then let’s get in and go a-snooping,” urged Terry.
Jim raised the window fully and stepped into the room, Terry following closely at his heels. They paused to make out their surroundings, when Terry gripped Jim’s arm tightly.
“Somebody in this room!” he hissed.
Before Jim could move someone stepped out of the closet and confronted them. For a single instant there was a silence that froze them, and then the light from the hall fell on the features of the one who stared at them.
“Don!” they whispered.
A sigh of pure relief broke from the one who had stepped out of the closet. “Boy, oh boy,” Don returned. “You two fellows scared me out of a year’s growth!”
“You gave us a mighty good start, too,” returned Terry as they moved close to him. “What are you doing in here?”
“I have the cup!” Don replied.
“No fooling?” gasped Jim.
“Yes, it was in that closet. Listen, we have got to get out of here. The two Gates—”
A cry broke out on the third floor and a door slammed. They waited to hear no more.
“Quickly, out the window with you,” cried Don. “We’ve got to clear this house on the double!”
Terry skipped through the window like lightning and Jim threw himself after him. Just before Don followed he could hear Arthur Gates roaring at the butler on the third floor. He joined his companions on the roof.
“Go on down and I’ll toss the cup to you,” he told Jim.
“Shall I take a chance by dropping off the roof?” asked Jim.
“No,” said Don. “You might break a leg, and you don’t know where you’ll land.”
Jim measured his distance and jumped up, catching the limb and swinging out on it with the agility of a monkey. He slid down the tree and dropped safely to the ground.
“Drop the cup,” he called.
Don dropped the cup over the edge of the roof and it fell to the ground. It was still boxed and he had no fear that any harm would come to it. Terry was already in the tree and swinging down toward the ground.
Jim, leaning down to pick up the box, felt himself gripped by a strong hand, which fastened itself on his shoulder. Before he could cry out he was dragged upright, to find himself in the grasp of the caretaker. Terry landed at the foot of the tree and was immediately seized by the other hand of the man. So taken by surprise were they that for the moment they uttered no sound.
“Goodnight!” flashed through the mind of the red-headed boy. “The end of a perfect day!”