The Secret of the Stolen Signals

By ELMER A. DAWSON

Author of "Garry Grayson's Hill Street Eleven," "Garry Grayson Showing His Speed," Etc.

ILLUSTRATED BY Walter S. Rogers

NEW YORK GROSSET & DUNLAP PUBLISHERS

Made in the United States of America

Copyright, 1926, by GROSSET & DUNLAP

Garry Grayson's Football Rivals

GARRY TUCKED THE BALL UNDER HIS ARM AND TORE THROUGH.

CHAPTER I

Falling from the Skies

"It won't be long now, fellows, before we get a chance at the old football," exulted Garry Grayson as he and his companions made their way through the woods about two miles from Lenox, their home town.

"The season can't come too quickly to suit me," returned Rooster Long, as he avoided a spreading root that threatened to trip him. "Gee, my foot is fairly itching for the feel of the pigskin!"

"And now that we're no longer lowly freshmen, we may have a look in for the regular team," remarked Nick Danter.

"Here's hoping," put in big Bill Sherwood. "Of course, to be on the scrubs is better than nothing, but I'm good and tired of being the doormat for the first-string fellows."

"I guess we all are," observed Ted Dillingham. "One thing is certain, anyway. They can't keep Garry off the regulars after the way he played in that game that won the championship for Lenox High. Gee, that was some football playing, I'll tell the world!"

"It isn't a cinch for anybody," declared Garry soberly. "But so many of the old stars graduated in June that there'll be a good many places to be filled. There's Dittler, for instance—"

"And that boy will certainly be missed!" exclaimed Nick Danter. "The whole backfield was built around him. When it came to bucking the line and skirting the ends, there wasn't a player in the High School League that could give him any points."

"Right you are," agreed Garry. "The boy was a wonder. Minter, too, was no slouch, and they don't come any better than Payne. Both of them are gone, and it will be mighty hard work to fill their shoes."

"But the biggest loss of all is Ralph Wynn," asserted Rooster Long. "Look at the way he ran the team. Used his brains every minute. Many's the game he's won by quick thinking. He had the beef, too, and the speed. It won't look like the same old team with the captain gone."

"It's a blow to the school and the team," Bill acquiesced. "But that's all in the game. The other schools will have lost some of their stars, too; so in the long run things will about even up."

"We've got one bit of luck, anyway, in having Mr. Phillips as our coach," put in Ted Dillingham.

"That's right," agreed Garry heartily. "At first it looked as though he was going to have hard work in filling Coach Garwin's place, but the way Mr. Phillips brought the team through to the championship showed that he was there with the goods."

"You said a mouthful that time," agreed Nick.

"Luck for Garry that old Shrugg did the disappearing act when he did," remarked Ted with a grin. "That English prof sure had it in for one fellow on the scrubs."

"And all because of a muddy football!" laughed Bill Sherwood, referring to an unfortunate occasion when Garry Grayson, quite by accident, had kicked a ball heavy with mud into the face of Trompet Shrugg, thereby ruffling that gentleman's temper as well as bespattering his immaculate waistcoat.

"Speaking of mud," put in Rooster, glancing skyward, "it sure looks as though we were going to have plenty of it before long. See that row of banked-up clouds?"

"Just wind clouds," scoffed Garry, giving Rooster a poke in the ribs with a four-foot branch he had picked up from the ground.

Rooster grabbed the end of it and a spirited tussle ensued. By the time Garry had succeeded in wresting the improvised weapon from his friend's grasp the sky was definitely overcast with heavy clouds. The prophecy of storm seemed about to be fulfilled.

"Never knew it to fail just when we'd planned to catch some fish and have a good time," grumbled Nick Danter, as he looked disconsolately at his fishing rod.

"Oh, stop your grouching," counseled Rooster. "We're close to the creek now and we'll have plenty of time to catch a mess before it rains. Those clouds may blow over. Anyway, we've got a better chance to make a catch on a cloudy day."

"Righto," asserted Garry. "I'm for the fish every time. A few drops of rain won't hurt us, anyhow."

"It may make the wood too wet to burn, though," observed Ted Dillingham. "And there's no fun catching fish if you can't cook them."

"I guess we can rake enough dry brush together for a fire," predicted Bill hopefully.

"You fellows are talking as though we had a mess already," laughed Nick. "Perhaps we won't have a nibble."

"We won't, eh?" scoffed Ted. "Just watch me land 'em! Say, who's got that can of worms?"

Rooster Long produced that highly necessary adjunct to a fishing excursion, and the boys hastened their steps down the narrow woods path that led to the stream.

It was by no means their first visit to the spot. The creek was an inlet to Bass Lake and abounded in fish that had many times had their numbers depleted by the young fishermen.

"The fellows that don't catch any will have to build the fire," pronounced Garry Grayson, as he got his tackle ready. "Is that a go?"

"Seems like rubbing it in," returned Rooster, grinning. "But you can't bluff me. Bet I land the first one."

"And I'll get the biggest one," predicted Ted.

"Brag's a good dog, but Holdfast's a better," remarked Bill Sherwood, with a superior air, as he baited his hook.

Nick said nothing, but his line hit the water first and was grabbed almost immediately by a hungry perch that the boy landed in fine style.

"I'll let the fish do my talking for me," and he grinned tantalizingly as he displayed his catch.

"If it can talk more like a fish than you do, it's pretty good," Rooster came back at him.

A few minutes later Garry landed a still bigger perch. Then Ted caught a catfish and Bill captured a bass. Other fish were captured from time to time, but luck constantly eluded Rooster Long, though several times he sought what he thought might be better positions for his purpose.

At the end of twenty minutes Garry counted their catch.

"Nine in all," he announced. "That's more than we can eat, and I'm as hungry as a wolf. Rooster's the goat. Come, varlet," he commanded, addressing that youth, "rustle us some brushwood and make a fire for your betters."

Rooster picked up a fish and threw it at him, but Garry dodged and the fish caught Ted Dillingham square in the mouth.

"Say!" sputtered that young lad indignantly, as he used his handkerchief vigorously, "why don't you hit what you aim at? Are you cross-eyed? Think I want my fish raw?"

"There, there, Ted," said Garry soothingly, "you ought to be glad to suffer for a friend. Think of how much worse you'd have felt if it had hit me."

"Not on your life I wouldn't!" grumbled Ted, still plying his handkerchief. "I'll smell that fish all day."

"I don't see why," remarked Bill innocently. "It's perfectly fresh."

"Not half as fresh as some fellows I know," retorted Ted, as he looked about for something to throw at his tormentors.

But they laughingly scurried out of reach and then turned to cleaning the fish. By the time Rooster had the fire going, the fish were ready, and soon the delicious aroma whetted still further the young appetites that needed no sharpening.

They had brought cocoa with them in two milk bottles and this they heated in an old saucepan that Garry Grayson's mother had loaned to them for such occasions. There were plenty of sandwiches, besides buttered rolls and jam. The feast was one fit for a king, the boys thought, as they munched fish and rolls and drank cocoa out of tin cups.

"This is the life!" sighed Rooster Long contentedly. "And this fish," with another huge bite, "sure is the berries."

"Keep still a minute!" cried Bill Sherwood. "What's that?"

Complete silence fell upon the group, broken only by the crackling of the fire. Then through the quiet came a humming sound like the whirring of a powerful motor.

"It's either a car burning up the road—" began Ted.

"Or an airplane," finished Garry. "Sounds more like one of those birds to me."

"It's an airplane, all right," declared Bill. "And it sounds as though it were right overhead."

The whir of the motor grew to a roar, and the boys, starting to their feet and staring up through the trees, saw the great man-made bird sweep nearly overhead, coming for a moment between them and the lowering sky.

As they watched, the plane appeared to waver, then make a dart downward.

The boys cried out in alarm.

But in a moment the pilot seemed to have recovered control, and the great machine winged its way upward, engine once more purring rhythmically.

"That guy's got engine trouble, all right," declared Nick Danter, with a shake of his head.

"I'd sure hate to take a dip like that," remarked Rooster, filling his tin cup again. "Apt to scramble your brains—"

"Providing you have any," grinned Garry. "Say, listen, old boy, sling over another of those rolls, will you?"

Rooster obeyed, then turned to Bill Sherwood.

"I've been meaning to ask you, Bill," he said, "how Frank was getting along."

"Fine," replied Bill, his face beaming. "Guess the old boy has learned his lesson. Buckling down to his work like a dog at a bone. And home—" He paused, and then added with a grin: "Is once more home. Frank sure did upset us all for a while."

"There's another fellow who should have learned his lesson too," put in Ted, his brows knitting into a scowl. "And that's Sandy Podder."

"Not a bit of it!" declared Nick. "You'd have a hard time knocking anything into that guy's thick skull. He was scared for a while, of course, at the close squeak he had in that Gyp Mooney robbery; but now he's getting into his stride again. I hear all sorts of things about his goings on. He's got it in for you too, Garry, good and plenty—don't make any mistake about that."

Garry Grayson shrugged.

"I'm not lying awake worrying about it, you bet," he rejoined carelessly.

"Just the same, what Nick says is right," said Bill, poking at the fire with a long stick. "It was your father, Garry, who showed him up in that last rough stuff he tried to pull, and you yourself got the information from Jerry Cox that put him on the fritz. Sandy Podder isn't the fellow to forget anything like that. Take it from me, he'll get even if he can."

"Well, let him try it," said Garry cheerfully. "We've outwitted that rascal several times already, and I guess we can again, if we have to. But say, fellows, here comes the rain."

A splash fell on the embers of their fire, followed by another and yet another.

The boys jumped to their feet, hastily gathering up the remnants of their feast, their rods, and can of bait.

"Guess we'll have to run for it," conjectured Rooster. "From the look of the sky it'll soon be coming down in bucketfuls."

"How about Peeble's cabin?" Nick suggested, referring to a tumbledown hut in the woods whose former owner had long since passed into the great beyond, leaving his earthly habitat to the mercy of wind and storm.

Poor as it was, it would yet afford some shelter from the rain, and, as soon as they had looked to the remnants of their fire, the boys turned their steps toward it.

They had barely reached it and slammed the rickety door to behind them when the storm broke in fury, dashing upon the leaky roof and beating at the dirty, cracked windows.

Through the largest hole in the roof, the rain was beginning to drip in an ever-increasing stream.

"Hey, there's a shower bath for you, Garry!" cried Rooster, and held his chum beneath the trickle.

Garry dodged the unwelcome shower and in retaliation grabbed Rooster and held him beneath the stream, which coursed chillingly down the hapless Rooster's back.

Rooster howled, and with a convulsive effort freed himself from Garry's grasp, at the same time butting his head against the ribs of his adversary.

In the laughing scrimmage, both boys went down and rolled over and over on the rotting floor of the cabin, to the huge delight of their chums.

"Soak him, Garry!"

"Attaboy, Rooster!"

"Go to, you fel—"

The words were interrupted by a rending crash, and the next moment it seemed as though the universe had come down about their ears!

CHAPTER II

A Close Call

Borne down to the floor, blinded, dazed, the boys lay half buried beneath the wreckage, the rain beating down upon them, soaking them through and through.

What had happened? What was it that had come crashing down upon them from the sky, bringing destruction in its wake?

This question Garry Grayson asked himself confusedly as he rubbed his bruised head and tried painfully to extricate himself from the mass of wreckage.

He pulled one leg from beneath some boards and found with relief that he could move it. Encouraged by the test, he tried the other one.

"Nothing broken," he muttered. Then, his head clearing, he looked around him fearfully for his companions.

Rooster and Nick were emerging slowly, bewilderedly, from a pile of wreckage. Bill was sitting on the floor, head buried in his arms, so dazed that he did not know what was going on around him.

All this Garry took in at a glance. And he saw also what it was that had crashed down upon them from the sky, almost completely demolishing Peeble's little cabin.

For an airplane, or what remained of one, was perched upon the wreckage, its damaged wings half supported by the tough, bending boughs of trees on either side of the ruined hut.

Garry looked about him for the pilot, and saw at some distance a pitiful, huddled figure that showed no signs of life.

He staggered to his feet and was about to go to the aid of the unfortunate fellow when a horrible thought stopped him.

Rooster and Nick were safe. Bill was rubbing his head as though his addled brains were getting ready to function again.

But Ted Dillingham! Where was Ted?

He was nowhere in sight. Garry rushed forward to a place where the timbers lay thickest, imagining Ted crushed, mangled, perhaps dead. Even as he did so, there came an explosion, and a darting, red flame shot out beneath the battered body of the airplane.

Fire! And somewhere beneath the wreckage lay Ted at the mercy of the flames!

Garry yelled hoarsely to his befuddled companions.

"Ted is under there somewhere!" he cried. "Come on, boys! Work fast! We've got to get him out!"

His chums' heads cleared like magic, and the boys worked with feverish haste while the fire crept ever closer. They called Ted's name over and over again as they tore at the rough boards, searching for him.

At last came a faint answer, and their efforts were redoubled. At last they found Ted, pinned helplessly beneath a pile of boards, only his head visible!

"Hurry, fellows, hurry!" cried Garry in agony. "Quick, before the fire gets at him!"

Garry Grayson, now fourteen years old, had been born and brought up in Lenox, a thriving town with a population of about fifteen thousand. His father was Joseph S. Grayson, a prominent lawyer of the town and a leader in all its civic activities. Mrs. Grayson was a sweet, wholesome woman, intensely proud of her son Garry and his twin sister, Ella, a merry, pretty girl, whose chief delight was in teasing her brother, of whom, however, she was extremely fond. The family lived in a handsome home at the corner of Hill and Maple Streets in a choice residential section of Lenox.

Garry was strong and well built for his age, and a natural leader in all boyish sports, especially football, of which he was an ardent devotee. He had a frank, sunny face and a manly, straightforward disposition. Chief among his friends were Nick Danter and Ted Dillingham, whose respective fathers were partners in the largest department store in Lenox, Rooster Long and Bill Sherwood. They had been drawn together by mutual liking, and this friendship had been further cemented by the interest that all took in the game of football.

But if Garry had many warm friends, he also had some enemies, of whom the principal one was Sandy Podder, a loose-principled, dissipated youth somewhat older than Garry and his chums, with whom Garry had frequently come in conflict, due to Sandy's low tricks and scheming. To these were added Chat Johns and Bud Warding, bullies of the same stripe who had been in Garry's class at the Hill Street Grammar School. Later came Lent Stewart, son of a rich broker, who, despite the fact that Garry had once saved him from drowning, was unfriendly and found in Sandy Podder a congenial pal and abettor of his plans.

How Garry's enthusiasm for football prompted him to organize a team in his grammar school; the trials and tribulations of the eleven as it was gradually licked into shape; how Garry thwarted the plans of Sandy Podder and some traitors in his own school; what difficulties he met and what obstacles he surmounted before he led his team to victory over the other grammar schools of the town—all these and other adventures are narrated in the first volume of this series entitled: "Garry Grayson's Hill Street Eleven; or, The Football Boys of Lenox."

The next fall Garry entered the Lenox high school, accompanied by Nick, Ted, Rooster and Bill. Here they found themselves bucking against the tradition that no freshman could be permitted to play on the regular football team. They did get places, however, on the scrubs, and gave the regulars all they could do to hold their own.

Sickness depleted the Lenox High regular team. That gave Garry his chance, and how his wonderful playing helped Lenox to the championship of the High School League is fully told in the second book of the series, entitled: "Garry Grayson at Lenox High; or, The Champions of the Football League."

Now to return to the frantic boys as they tossed the boards aside to free their imprisoned comrade while the flames crept ever nearer.

"Buck up, Ted, old boy," Garry cried cheerfully. "We'll have you out of there now in a jiffy."

"I know you will," replied Ted gamely in a tone of confidence that he was far from feeling.

Now the rain, at which they had so grumbled a little while before, did them a good turn. Under the torrents that were by this time falling, the hastening fire began to relax some of its speed. It was this alone that made it possible for them at last to drag their comrade from under the last of the boards and carry him out into the open air. And never was the cool air so sweet as at that moment!

"Are you hurt anywhere, Ted?" asked Garry anxiously, as they propped the lad up against a tree.

"N-no, I guess not," gasped Ted, trying hard to summon up a smile.

Garry ran his hands over Ted's arms and legs and was infinitely relieved to find that no bones were broken.

"You see some of the boards formed a sort of tent over me so that I didn't get the full weight of the timbers," explained Ted.

"He's all right, fellows. We'll leave him here till he gets his breath back while we go and look after the pilot," announced Garry.

"I'm going too!" exclaimed Ted, seeing for the first time the still figure of the pilot. But an attempt to get to his feet showed him that first he must get a little rest and regain his strength, for his had been no light experience.

The others hurried over to the limp form of the aviator. He lay in a crumpled heap, and as the boys bent over him they feared for a moment that the worst had happened; that he was dead.

Big Bill Sherwood turned him over on his back, pulled open his leathern jacket, and slipped a hand within his shirt. The boys looked on with hearts stirring with fear and pity.

Slowly a relieved smile stole over Bill's face.

"I can feel his heart thumping," he said. "The poor fellow's a long way from being dead yet."

As though to prove the truth of the statement, the man opened his eyes and stared vacantly around him. Then he sat up suddenly, freeing himself from Bill's supporting arm.

"The wires!" he cried, wildly. "One is broken. I must fix it, quick! Quick!" Then with a groan: "Too late! Too late!" He was evidently recalling the fearful moment of the plunge. "She's falling! Those trees! How close they are! The trees!"

CHAPTER III

The Wounded Aviator