“I guess I’d better get back to my hotel,” announced the detective, as night came on. “I can’t do anything more for you boys, and I want to wire a report to Mr. Carter. There’s no use of me staying in Newton any longer, for it’s evident now that Brown and Black are far away.”
“Yes, so far that I doubt if we ever catch them,” remarked Ned dubiously.
“Oh, yes we will,” exclaimed Jerry confidently. “We’ll not give up yet. We’ll keep on going west, for I believe that’s where we’ll find them.”
“And that’s where we’ll get my flying frog,” put in the professor.
Night saw the boys heading due west in their craft, the detective having alighted on the outskirts of the town, to make his way back to his hotel. He wished them all success.
“We’ll travel all night,” decided Jerry to his chums, “for I believe those men will make long flights, and it’s no use looking for them within several hundred miles of this place. They’d want to put as great a distance as possible between themselves and Harmolet.”
“That’s right,” agreed Ned, who was now converted to the views of his two chums. “We’ll keep on until daylight, and then go down and make inquiries as to whether or not any airships have been seen lately.”
The hours of darkness passed without incident, and when morning came the boys found themselves over a small country town. They were flying low enough so that the craft was speedily made out by some early risers. The word quickly went around, and soon there was a good-sized crowd gazing earnestly upward.
But their anxious inquiries resulted in nothing. There had been no signs of any other airship, and theirs was the first the inhabitants of the town had ever seen. Nor had any one heard the noise of the motors of one of the craft passing onward in the night.
When they were ready to start again, Professor Snodgrass, as usual, was not on hand. They made a search for him, and found him on the bank of the mill pond, industriously catching frogs in his net. He had engaged half a dozen enthusiastic boys, promising that whoever found the flying frog would get five dollars. The boys had dozens of the hapless creatures in tin cans, but all proved to be of the ordinary kind.
“I guess we’ll have to look farther west,” admitted the scientist with a sigh, as he accompanied the boys back to the air ship. “Though when I saw those insects I thought sure I’d have my frog. However, I’m on the right track, I’m positive of that.”