sework, the boys got the keys to the
radio room. The rest was easy, even to fixing up camouflaged parts that
would befool Mr. Royce, if he should enter the room. They got the
apparatus in parts to their own room, where they packed it up, and Gus
climbed into Tompkins' room through the transom, handed out the portable
set and got out the way he got in.

The next day, again sending for Mr. Merritt and his taxi, they were on
their way to the station at Guilford, and from there by train to the
shore, Gus debouching at a convenient junction for a two-hour trip home,
while Bill patiently waited. When Gus got back to the junction he had
the shotgun and some old clothes for both, though Bill might have no
need to disguise.

Reaching the terminus of the railroad, the boys hired a rather
dilapidated team of mules drawing a farm wagon, with youthful driver to
match, and made a long, slow journey, especially tiresome to these
eager, expectant lads, that landed them by the most direct route at
Oysterman Dan's little cottage.

The old fellow came out and was so delighted to see Gus that he gave him
and Bill a real welcome. He was a bachelor who lived alone, but lived
well. He kept to himself and yet was not averse to having a little
company of his own choosing. Apparently he would not have wanted more
entertaining fellows than Bill and Gus, or better listeners, for he
liked to spin yarns. When he found the boys insisted upon paying him for
board and lodging and certain privileges he was further pleased. Let
them put up "one o' them thar wirelesses?" He sure would and welcome. It
would be a "heap o' fun," and when they told him of the purpose of it he
was elated.

Nothing could have been more characteristic of the imagination and
optimism of youth than the making of all these extensive preparations on
the merest guesswork, and after the boys had arrived on the scene, not
half a mile from Lower Gifford's Point, doubts began to assail Bill with
much force.

"By jingo, Gus! Here we are, at considerable expense and a deal of
trouble, taking it for granted that we're going to do wonderful things,
and we even don't know that the theory we are working on is worth a
blamed thing."

"Oh, yes; we do," said the intuitive Gus, who, looking like a woebegone
swamp dweller, had just come in from the dunes. "And soon we'll know a
whole lot more. I just saw two gunners in the woods above the point, and
if they aren't Italians I don't know one.