rested. "Can't you see they were made by scout shoes? Do you
think a boy scout stole the car? Here are some others, too, S.N.'s, and
Safety First's, I suppose."

"Why should they step outside the big door?" Norton asked. "These are
fresh footprints, all of them. After they got through, they'd go out
through the small door wouldn't they? This print, and this one, and this
one," he said, holding a match, "were made by scout shoes--_to-night_,
not an hour ago."

"All the fellows except us two are in camp," said Nick.

"All right," Fido Norton shot back, "they might all be at the North
Pole, but these prints were made by scout shoes _to-night_. That's what
I'm telling you."

"All right," said Nick with a tolerant sneer in his voice, "the car was
stolen by a boy scout, probably a tenderfoot. Maybe it was stolen by a
girl scout--"

"No, they're scout shoe prints," said Norton, ignoring his friend's
sarcasm, "and they're not an hour old, not a half hour, that's what I
think."

"Well, actions speak louder than footprints," said Nick; "what are we
going to do, that's the question?"

"Whatever you say," said Norton cheerfully.

CHAPTER XVII

ACTION

"Well then I say let's send up a signal," said Nick hurriedly, "the
fellows at camp will see it and everybody else for miles around will see
it. Every telegraph operator along the railroad can read it. Forget
about scouts stealing cars and do what I tell you. Hustle up to the
police station and tell them about it so they can't say we didn't report
it, then meet me at the town hall."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to use the old search-light if it will work. It hasn't been
used since the night of the armistice when they lighted up the flag with
it. Climb in through the broken window on the side and come up into the
cupola. Don't tell Chief Bungelheimer or he'll say it was his idea. My
father's on the town committee, it's all right, hustle now, get the
police department off your hands and maybe we can do something--no
telling. Remember, the side window, the one that's broken. And look out
for the ladder, it's rotten. Hurry up, beat it!"

Fido Norton hurried to the police station in back of Ezra Corbett's
store and aroused Officer Dopeson who was at the desk waiting for
out-of-town speeders to be brought in. In a kind of waking dream the
officer heard an excited voice shout, "Mr. Ned Garrison's car is stolen
from the shed down by the lake."

When Off