The Boys of the Wireless Part 14

"Did I get it?" smiled Harry. "Work, hard work, fellows," and there was a mingled pride and fondness in Harry's voice. "That little heap means over a year of hard knocks and close sc.r.a.pings, before I had the typhoid fever."

A strange silence fell over the trio of chums. Harry had come into the life of Tom and Ben in a strange way, and had won their confidence and friends.h.i.+p from the start. He had become quite a fixture at the Barnes homestead. Mr. Barnes had come to depend on him for an hour or two of pottering around at odd tasks on the farm, and felt that his young helper amply paid for his meals and lodging. At length Tom spoke, his face flushed with pleasure.

"You're a queer fellow, Harry," he said heartily, "and you are a good fellow. You are willing to lend me this money?"

"Willing?" repeated Harry. "Glad, honored, delighted. Is a hundred enough?"

"Yes, indeed."

"All right, there it is. Don't you look at me in that leery way, Ben Dixon," said Harry, with a chuckle. "I haven't been stealing anything.

That money is mine, all mine, and honestly mine. There is this much I will tell you about it, though: it is a part of a certain amount I am hoping to reach to pay a certain person."

"Money that you owe?" ventured Ben, consumed with curiosity.

"Yes, and no. I'm to save five hundred dollars,"

"Whew! that's a heap."

"I'll reach it," declared Harry confidently-"in time. It's money that I must repay."

"That you borrowed?"

"No."

"Oh, that you took?" insinuated Ben, in his blunt, straightforward way.

"No, sir! Do you take me for a thief?" cried Harry indignantly. "I'll tell you this much more: I was living with a man I didn't like so very much. I made up my mind to cut out from him. I wanted first to find some papers of mine I believed he had in his possession. When he was away from home one night, I took a lighted candle and made a tour of investigation. I came across a pile of banknotes. A strip around them said 'Five Hundred Dollars.' I went on searching for what I was after, but didn't find it. When I turned around to take up the candle, the drawer in which I had placed it was all ablaze. The banknotes were a heap of crisp cinders."

"Well!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Ben.

"I tell you I was scared," confessed Harry. "He was a close-fisted, mysterious old fellow, and-well, I decided to get out. I left a note telling the circ.u.mstances of the accident, and said that I would work my finger nails off to earn that five hundred dollars and bring it back to him, some day. I've been doing it ever since."

"That's a remarkable story, Harry Ashley," said Ben, in earnest admiration.

Harry pushed the bills over to Tom, restored the belt to its place, and, with the indifference of a millionaire, started for the trap door.

"I must tell the peddler's wife about her husband's delay," he said.

"Glad to oblige you, Tom. I'll be back soon."

Tom grasped the banknotes thoughtfully, and with an expression of gladness and relief on his face.

"What luck!" commented Ben.

"I am awfully glad to get the money," said Tom, with deep feeling.

"Harry is a splendid fellow. It's only a loan, but think what it means to me just at this time!"

"There's something!" exclaimed Ben suddenly.

"h.e.l.lo!" said Tom, all attention at once to the clicks. Then his face broke into a smile.

"'Donner' again!" cried Ben.

"After a lapse of two days," observed Tom. "Listen."

The mysterious "spook" of Mr. Edson was in evidence once more.

"He's getting along better," said Ben.

"'Donner' tapped that out pretty fair. 'Lost boy.' What's that? 'Money'

again. Thousand dollars.' He's getting extravagant. 'Donner.' H'm!"

There was a lapse. Tom laughed and Ben chuckled. "Donner" was a standing joke now.

"There, he's at it again," announced Ben a moment later. "'Donner. Lost boy.' Yes, we've heard that before. h.e.l.lo! here's something new."

"Yes," nodded Tom, translating the message: "Lost boy named Ernest Warren. Look out for sun, moon and stars on his left shoulder."

"Wonder who the lost boy can be?" said Ben in a ruminative tone.

They were soon to learn that-in a startling and unexpected manner.

CHAPTER XI-A GREAT STEP FORWARD

"Mr. Barnes, I believe?"

"Yes, I am Tom Barnes," said the young wireless operator of station Z.

Tom was in the old windmill tower, and had been tidying up generally. He had just come from dinner, and was alone in the operating room.

He had checked himself in the middle of a whistling tune to survey a head and then the shoulders and body of a stranger, coming up through the trap door.

The intruder was a keen-eyed, sharp-featured man of about thirty, very neatly dressed, and very erect and soldierly in his general appearance.

He nodded briskly to Tom, crossed the room, and, uninvited, sank into the nearest chair.

"Glad I found you," he said, and then took a close survey of Tom and of the furnis.h.i.+ngs of the room. "Heard about you at the town, and being somewhat interested in these new-fangled wireless ideas, I thought you wouldn't mind a casual visitor."

"No, indeed," answered Tom readily. "I am only too glad to meet anybody who is interested as to our little station here."

"It's quite a plant," declared the stranger. "Tell me something about it, will you?"

An enthusiastic boy like Tom was only too ready to enter into a general description of the parts and utilities of the apparatus. The stranger listened intently, approbatively too, it seemed to Tom. He followed the indication of Tom's finger as it pointed out this and that attachment of the general operating device; and arose and looked closer as Tom explained in detail and very clearly some intricate features of the mechanism.

"That's pretty interesting," voiced the man at length, "and you seem to know your business."