the window.

"Stop, you thief! Hold up, or I'll shoot!" warned the inventor.

However, the skulker took to his heels. Pollard fired once, the flame
spitting from the muzzle of his revolver. But the figure still continued
in flight, and the inventor realized that there was no further use in
firing.

"That was odd," thought Pollard. "The fellow had on a uniform just such
as our boys wear. If it weren't so absurd, I might be tempted to
believe, despite the darkness, that it was Jack Benson. But _he_ would
have no need to break in here."

Then Mrs. Farnum appeared, with the servants, for the shot had alarmed
the household.

"Have you found that anything is missing from here?" inquired Mrs.
Farnum, while Mr. pollard searched and explained at the same time.

The inventor now halted before his desk, rummaging.

"Yes," he answered, dryly, though with a slight quaver in his voice. "The
thief found and departed with the drawings of a most important new
device, originated by Benson and his friends and finished by myself. I'd
rather lose a large sum of money than those drawings."

At about this time Jacob Farnum was prowling carefully about the spot
that Mr. Emerson had named. He waited there, in hiding, for a long time,
ere Messrs. Melville and Emerson came along. He let them pass, then