"Who do you suppose those two men are that we saw come out of the
cave?" Miles Berryman inquired.

"The chances are ninety-nine out of a hundred that this affair is
connected directly with the strike," Clifford replied, with confident
assurance. "The highwaymen who plotted this scheme doubtless belong to
the rougher element of the strikers. They are really dangerous men,
and the community would be much safer if they were lodged in prison."

"How do you suppose they got your uncle to come away out here at the
time when he usually starts home for dinner--that is, if he really
came this way?" asked Hal Ettelson.

"That's the very thing that's bothering me most," Clifford replied,
with puzzled air. "Uncle is usually pretty shrewd, and I am pretty
certain that people who try to put anything over on him generally find
that they have a hard job on their hands."

"I'd take it, from the note Jerry found, that this is a decoy game
they're trying to work," Ernie remarked.

"It'd have to be a sharp one to get my uncle," declared Clifford.
"He's a very clever business man."

"The smartest men get caught once in a while," was Ernie's sage
remark.

"That must have been a chauffeur who wrote that note," observed Johnny
St. John. "It read as if a chauffeur was the brains of this plot. If
we get there on time, he won't have much to chauffeur it" (show for