“That, probably,” suggested Bolt, “is the night matron from the hospital. She was making investigations when I left, and promised to come here at once on the discovery of anything new in the case.”
Havens hastened to the office building and there, as the surgeon had predicted, found the night matron waiting for him.
“I can’t understand,” she said addressing the millionaire abruptly, without waiting for him to speak, “what is going on at the hospital to-night! Immediately after the departure of Doctor Bolt I sent word for every person, man or woman, connected with my service to appear in the reception room. In five minutes’ time I discovered that two men employed only three days ago were not present.
“After waiting a few moments for their appearance, I sent a messenger to their rooms. They were not there! Their beds had not been slept in, and every article of wearing apparel belonging to them had been taken from their closets.”
“One question,” Doctor Bolt said, addressing the matron. “Was any one on watch outside the door of the room in which I was so mysteriously put to sleep?”
“There was no one on watch there,” was the reply.
“Then,” declared Bolt, “the two attendants who have disappeared injected the anesthetic I have already referred to through the keyhole of the door. After I became unconscious they entered and removed the prisoner. It is all the fault of the hospital!”
The night matron turned up her nose at the surgeon.
The two flying machines, the _Louise_, with Jimmie and Carl on board, and the _Bertha_, with Ben in charge, flew swiftly over the great city, lying before them with its lights stretching out like strings of beads, crossed the North river with its fleets of vessels, and passed on over New Jersey, heading directly for the west.
At first Jimmie and Carl tried to carry on a conversation, but the snapping of the motors and the rush of the wind in their faces effectually prevented anything of the kind. The moon was well down in the west, yet its light lay over the landscape below in a silvery radiance.
Now and then as they swept over a city or a cluster of houses far out on a country road, lights flashed about, and voices were heard calling from below. Ignoring all invitations to descend and explain their presence there, the boys swept on steadily until the moon disappeared under the rim of the sky.