Afloat on the Flood | Page 4

Then they saw that while his

round face was red, and the perspiration stood out in beads on his
forehead, there was a drawn, almost a scared look on his countenance.
"Hey! what ails the fellow?" burst out Lil Artha, as though discovering
that Landy was trembling more with some mysterious emotion than
fatigue.
"Yeth, hurry up and tell uth what's happened!" cried Ted Burgoyne,
jumping off his perch, and hastening to the side of the panting boy.
Landy seemed to swallow something that may have been threatening to
choke him. Then making a great effort, he managed to say a few words.
"Terrible thing's happened, fellows! Knocks the reputation of the Wolf
Patrol all to smithereens!"
Of course, this excited those four scouts as nothing else could have
done.
"Has anything happened to Elmer?" almost shouted Toby.
"No, it's Hen Condit!" answered Landy; "he's gone and stole a lot of
money from his guardian, and lit out, that's what! And him belonging to
the Wolf Patrol, too!"
CHAPTER II
WHEN HEN CONDIT LEFT TOWN
"Hey! say that over again, won't you, Landy! I sure believe my ears
must have fooled me!" exclaimed Lil Artha.
"Hen Condit robbed his uncle and guardian, are you telling us, Landy?"
gasped Toby; "aw! come off, now, you're just giving us taffy, thinking
it smart."
"I tell you I just came from their house," continued the perspiring scout,
mopping his reeking forehead with a suspicious looking handkerchief

that may once on a time have been really white. "You see, Mr. Condit
didn't get up as early as he generally does, because he had a terrible
headache. And say, they even think he might have been given a dose of
chloroform to make him sleep longer."
"Hold on, fellows," snapped Toby just then, "as luck will have it here
comes Elmer in his father's little runabout. He said he had to go over to
Rockaway on an important errand for his dad this morning, which was
the only reason he couldn't join us for a swim. Let's hold him up, and
Landy can tell the whole story then."
When they made urgent gestures to the boy in the swift-flying runabout,
he hastened to pull up, laughing at the same time.
"I hurried over and back on purpose to follow you fellows to the ole
swimmin' hole," he told them; "but I didn't expect to meet you on the
way. Don't delay me; I'll jump on my wheel to chase after you."
"But, Elmer, something awful has happened, and you ought to know
about it," declared Toby, at which the boy in the small car looked
searchingly at each of the others in turn, and seeing how grave they
appeared, he demanded what it meant.
"Why, you see," explained Lil Artha, "Landy here was late in joining
us. He just came along on his machine, pegging it for all he was worth,
and looking like he had seen one of the ghosts some people believe in.
He only started to tell us when you came in sight; but it's terrible. What
d'ye think, he says our Wolf Patrol comrade, Hen Condit, has run away
from home, and robbed his guardian in the bargain!"
Elmer instantly jumped to the road. He faced Landy as a lawyer might
a witness on the stand; and Elmer knew just how to "pump" a fellow so
as to get the principal facts without much loss of time, as his chums
understood.
"Go on and tell us about it, Landy," he commanded. "How did you
happen to learn about the fact in the first place?"

"Why, you see," answered the other, only too willing to explain to the
best of his ability, "ma, she sent me over on an errand to the Condit
house. I was madder'n hops about it, too, because I just knew I'd be
keepin' the fellows waiting here under the Grandaddy Oak."
"What did you find when you got there?" asked Elmer, who knew
Landy to be long-winded, and that often the quickest way to learn facts
from him was to put him on the grill.
"Why, they were all upset," admitted Landy. "Mr. Condit was as mad
as a bull in a china shop, and his wife was looking as white as chalk,
yes, and scared, too. Seems that when he went into his library after
eating breakfast he found the safe open and everything gone. It was an
'inside job' the Chief said, because nobody had busted the safe."
"Then the Chief was there, was he?" questioned the patrol leader.
"Sure he was; Mr. Condit had 'phoned to him. There were a dozen
neighbors in the house, too, and more acomin' right along. Biggest kind
of excitement. Oh! it's going to be town property before night, I guess,
and