CHAPTER V

MIDNIGHT BURGLARS


"What!" exclaimed Jimmy Toppan, "gone?"

"Gone," replied Ed Mason, "sailed away and left us. Like old Aaron
Halyard, in 'The Angel of Death'."

Mr. Daddles looked at him and grinned.

"At least, you remember your classics," he said, "you can fall
back on the consolations of literature in a time of sorrow."

"But he can't be gone," put in Jimmy, "he wouldn't sail off and
leave us like this. He must be somewheres about."

And he commenced to shout "On board the 'Hoppergrass'!" He got us
to shout the same phrase. The sailor-like way of putting it did
not please Ed Mason.

"Oh, I don't see any sense in shouting 'On board' of anything,
when the whole trouble is that we're not on board."

There was an echo from a building across the inlet--an insulting