must go in--I belong here in!" a voice cried. It had
a German accent, and at the sound of it Tom and Ned looked at each
other.

"Who is there?" asked the manager sharply of the foreman..

"Oh, a crazy German. He belongs in one of the other shops, and I guess
he's mixed up. He thinks he belongs here. I sent him about his
business."

"That is right," remarked the manager. "I gave orders, at your
request," he said to Tom, "that no one but the men in this part of the
plant were to be present at the casting. I cant understand what that
fellow wanted."

"I think I can," murmured Tom, to himself.

CHAPTER XIV

A NIGHT INTRUDER

"Tom, aren't you going to try to get a look at that German?" whispered
Ned, as he and his chum came down from the elevated gallery at the
conclusion of the cast. "I mean the one who tried to get in!"

"I'd like to, Ned, but I don't want to arouse any suspicion," replied
Tom. "I've got to stay here a while yet, and arrange about shrinking on
the jackets, after the core is rifled. I don't see how--"

"I'll slip out and see if I can get a peep at him," went on Ned. "If
it's like the one Koku described, we'll know that he's still after you."

"All right, Ned. Do as you like, only be cautious."

"I will," promised Tom's chum. So, while the young inventor was busy
arranging details with the steel manager, Ned slipped out of a side
door of the casting shop, and looked about the yard. He saw a little
group of workmen surrounding a man who appeared to be angry.

"I dell you dot is my shop!" one of the men was heard to exclaim--a man
whom the others appeared to dragging away with main force.

"And I tell you, Baudermann, that you're mistaken!" insisted one,
evidently a foreman. "I told you to work in the brazing department.
What do you want to try to force your way into the heavy casting
department for? Especially when we're doing one of the biggest jobs
that we ever handled--making the new Swift cannon."

"Oh, iss dot vot vas going on in dere?" asked the man addressed as
Baudermann. "Shure den, I makes a misdake. I ask your pardon, Herr
Blackwell. I to mine own apartment will go. But I dinks my foreman
sends me to dot place," and he indicated the casting shop from which he
had just been barred.

"All right!" exclaimed the foreman. "Don't make that mistake again, or
I'll dock you for lost time."

"Only just a twisted German employee, I guess," thought Ned, as he was
about to turn bac