CHAPTER XII
DAVE'S DISCOVERIES
"You have got a badge like mine for sale, you say?" exclaimed Dave.
"That's so," bobbed the tramp with a grin.
"Where did you get it?"
"That don't go with the sale, but I didn't steal it."
"You found it, I suppose?" suggested Dave.
"Well, you might call it so." The man drew from his pocket a badgewhich was the exact counterpart of that worn by the young aviator.
"Let me have a look at it," said Dave.
"No, sir."
"Why not?"
"You can see what it is, can't you? I don't want to get intotrouble, boss."
"I'm not going to get you into any trouble," declared Dave.
"Then why do you want to look at the badge? It's no different fromyours, is it?"
"Are there no marks on it?"
"Why, I didn't notice. Say, yes, there are," announced the tramp,scrutinizing the little piece of metal on the back of the badge."Looks like T. O."
Dave put his hand in his pocket.
"What do you want for it?" he asked.
Evidently the tramp was about to say "fifteen cents." He shrewdly,however, observed an interested if not an eager expression on Dave'sface, arid added:
"--ty cents."
"It's yours," replied Dave, promptly producing the coin. "Wh-e-w!"
Dave stared, started and gave utterance to a prolonged whistle. Hecame to his feet with a shock. Upon the rear plate of the badgewere scratched two letters, indeed--but the tramp had read themwrong. As read by Dave they were a mine of information.
Dave's mind ran rapidly. He sat down again on the bench. The trampgrinned broadly as Dave turned an eager and excited face upon him.
"Why," he chuckled, "you're real friendly, aren't you?"
"No trifling," said Dave seriously. "I'll give you a good deal morethan fifty cents if you tell me truthfully and right away how youcame by that badge."
"How much now?"
"Two dollars."
"The information is yours, Cap," answered the tramp, with an assumedair of grandness. "I found it."
"When?"
"At one o'clock yesterday morning."
"Where?"
"By the fence of the big Fly factory down yonder."
"You mean the Interstate works?"
"That's the place, I guess."
Dave became more interested than ever. He handed a two dollar billto the tramp without further question.
"Now, my man," he said, "I've been square with you."
"That's right," assented the tramp.
"I want you to tell me all about how you came by that badge."
"Well, boss, I'm troubled with asthma, and have to sleep out ofdoors nights."
"Go on."
"The police in the city know me moderately well, and I prefer thesuburbs."
"Don't fool--give me the facts."
"Night before last I camped down in a grassy spot near the fence ofthe big Fly factory. It must have been about midnight when I waswaked up. I heard somebody say: 'Oh, at take it!'"
"Who was it?"
"A boy about your size."
"What was he doing?" asked Dave.
"He was up on top of the fence. He had climbed up one of theslanting outside supports, I guess. You know there's two rows ofbarbed wire a-top of the boards. Well, there he was, making a greatfuss."
"What about?" inquired Dave.
"The back of his coat was all tangled up in the barbs. He couldn'tpull it loose. Then I heard some voices speak on the inside of thefence. There were two men there."
"You think they had got over first?"
"It looked that way. They told the boy to pull out of his coat. Hegot his arms out, started to untwist the coat, stuck his fingerswith the barbs, and tumbled over into the factory yard."
"And then?" pressed Dave eagerly.
"H'm! I went to sleep."
"What! not knowing but what they were burglars?"
"Boss, I never mix up with other people's business, good or bad."
"How did you come to get the badge?"
"Why, when I woke up at sunrise I saw the coat sticking on the fencewhere the boy had left it. I climbed up and got it. The badge waspinned to it."
"You haven't got the coat on."
"Good reason."
"What's that?"
"Well, my own coat is pretty ragged but it ain't a marker to the waythat boy's coat was riddled and torn by them barb wires."
"Didn't you search the coat?"
"Every time that, matey."
"And found--?"
"Humph! nothing."
"Nothing at all?"
"Oh, yes, there was some cigarettes, a stub of a pencil and a cardwith some marks and writing, on it."
"What did you do with the card?" asked Dave.
"Tossed it into the ditch with the coat."
"Do you remember where?"
"Sure, I do."
"I'll give you another dollar to take me to the spot."
"Say, you're a gold mine to me, Cap. Come ahead."
Dave was doing a good deal of active thinking. More than once, ashis companion led way around the high board fence enclosing theInterstate plant, Dave took out the badge he had bought andscrutinized the scratches on its back closely.
'The tramp guided the way across a bleak prairie stretch. Then hefollowed the dry ditch, until they came to a spot where thick clumpsof weeds directly lining the fence suggested a cozy resting andhiding place for any stray wayfarer.
"There's where I was asleep, as I told you," spoke Dave's companion,pointing to a spot where the weeds were somewhat trodden down. "Andthere's the place where the coat caught. See, there's one or twopieces of the cloth of the coat hanging in the barbs yet."
"Yes, I see," assented Dave. "Now, where did you throw the coat andthe things you found In it?"
The tramp moved about from place to place, got in line with thefence support, and looked down into the ditch. He moved alongslowly, his eyes on the ground. Finally he stooped down.
"Here's the coat--what there's left of it," he reported. "Here'sthat card, too. I can't find the pencil."
"Never mind that," replied Dave, extending his hand for theproffered objects.
"I smoked up the cigarettes."
Dave glanced eagerly at the card. He shoved it in a safe pocket.Then he rolled up the coat and placed it under his arm.
"Very good, very good, indeed," he said.
"Here's that dollar I promised you."
The tramp received the money, beaming all over his face.
"Say," he observed, as he moved on, "if it wasn't that you've mademe rich enough to retiree from business for a time, I'd offer tofind the owner of that coat and the fellows who were with him."
"I'll do just that," said Dave to himself in a satisfied way.
Then, his hand resting on the card in his pocket, he added:
"What luck!"