CHAPTER XIX

--A STARTLING MESSAGE

"I've come back again," announced the Barber boy, bursting upon Tom and Ben breathlessly.

"I see you have," said Tom pleasantly.

"Got something to show you. Maybe it's not important, but I thought it was, so I hurried here."

"You are doing me a lot of favors, Bill," said Tom.

"Glad to," declared Bill. "Here it is," and he extended a wrinkled-up object as he spoke.

"Why," cried Ben, peering curiously, "it's another of those toy balloons!"

"Yes," assented Bill. "They've been flying around half the morning. After I left here I ran across a crowd of youngsters chasing two sailing aloft. One of the boys had a bow and arrow, and was trying to hit one and bring it down. I'm some on shooting, and asked him for the bow. Missed the first time. Next time, though, the arrow went through the balloon, busted it, and sailed to the ground with it."

"And this is it?" questioned Tom.

"Yes. The little fellows ran after it and fought over it. I happened to see the tag, and was kind of curious about it. By the time I got it, though, the mob had trampled it in the mud, and their feet had torn away half of it. Here's what's left of it. Your name is on it, Tom, and that and the reward----"

"What reward?" inquired Ben quickly.

"It's on the back of the card," replied Bill.

"Ben," said Tom inspecting it, "this is another of my old cards."

"What's written on the back, Tom?" inquired Ben eagerly.

Tom held the card so Ben could read it as well as himself. A part of the card was gone, and some of the pencilled words it had originally contained were blurred and vague. What was left of it read:

"Take this to Tom Barnes and get ten dollars reward. Tom: I am a prisoner--two bad men--about thirty miles--in the--at--in lion's cage--_Harry Ashley_."

Tom scanned the card again and again. Ben noted his serious studious manner. Finally Tom turned to their visitor.

"Bill," he said, "you get the reward. I haven't the money with me, but any time to-morrow you call here and get it."

"Oh, I don't want any reward," declared Bill.

"You get it just the same," insisted Tom firmly.

"I'll have to be getting along," said Bill. "I'm watching that launch for Aldrich to put in an appearance. It's eleven dollars and seventy-five cents or a licking for him, I can tell you."

"I think I know where those balloons came from," said Tom to Ben, when Bill had departed.

"Where, Tom?"

"A circus."

"How so?"

"Those fragments of sentences on the card lead me to believe that the message should read about this way: 'I am a prisoner in the hands of two bad men about thirty miles from Rockley Cove, in the circus at Wadhams, shut up in the lion's cage.'"

Ben was on his feet in a bound, his face flushed with excitement.

"I'll bet you've solved it, Tom. And there is a circus at Wadhams just now. Why, it's just the place where these toy balloons would be likely to be on sale. And the mention of a lion's cage! That fits to a circus, too! I don't understand, though, how Harry has managed to send the balloons aloft, if he was shut up somewhere prisoner."

"We won't try to guess that out now," said Tom. "Here is certainly a big clue. Harry is an ingenious fellow, and somehow has managed to float these messages. I want you to stay here alone for a spell."

"Where are you going?" inquired Ben.

"To report to my father instanter," replied Tom; and he was off speedily.

It was the middle of the afternoon before Tom returned. Ben was anxiously awaiting him.

"What's the program?" he asked eagerly.

"You are to go up to the house at once, Ben. My father has the team hitched up and is waiting for you. A hired man is going, too, and the constable. Telephone your folks from the house that you may be away till morning. When you do come back, report here right away."

"All right, Tom."

"Storm signals are out, and one of us will have to stay on duty to-night."

The sky had been overcast all the morning. Long before dusk the forewarnings of a heavy storm were discoverable, and Tom realized an impending occasion when he was expected to exercise unusual vigilance.

At dark one of the field hands came to the tower with a warm supper sent by Tom's mother. He chatted with Tom for half an hour and left in a wild flurry of wind and rain.

By eight o'clock the full fury of the gale broke on land, already dangerous at sea, as Tom had noticed for some time previous. The wind arose to a hurricane, the rain came in sheets, and at times the thunder and lightning became terrific.

Tom was in constant readiness for service. His ear was close to the receiver. He knew from experience what these tempestuous nights meant for those at sea.

Suddenly there was a sharp series of sputtering, crackling sounds. Then the receiver gave: "y-3----y-3----y-3."

Tom thrilled. It was the first time in his experience as a wireless operator that the signal most dreaded had come into Station Z, for the quickly repeated letter and its accompanying numeral meant that some vessel at sea was in dire distress.

Tom clapped the receiver to his ear, and, even before it was in place he noted the clicking of the diaphragm, which told that the electric current was operating through the magnets. Then came a snap, as when a central telephone operator accidently "rings the bell" into one's ear. It was as though all the powerful current had concentrated itself into the receiver.

"Great Scott!" cried Tom. "With this storm I may get a shock if I'm not careful!"

He looked to his instruments, and glanced at the connections. They seemed to be in perfect order, and he was as well safeguarded as was possible.

There was a silence, and then more of the pounding in the receiver. The lad was forced to move it away from his ear, for it nearly deafened him.

"This is fierce!" he cried, as a terrific clap of thunder, following a vivid lightning flash, seemed fairly to shake the tower.

The instrument acted incoherently for the minute succeeding, and Tom could not make out the message that was coming. He sprang to the ropes that connected a tackle with the aerials aloft and ran the netting up into tune.

"She's coming clear now," said Tom.

"Y-3, off Garvey Rocks," ran the message. "Machinery broken and drifting. Send help. Steamer _Olivia_."

Tom recoiled with a shock. The _Olivia!_! That was the steamer upon which Grace Morgan and her aunt were passengers!

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