enthusiasm as that shown by the reporter himself.

Jimmy opened his eyes wide with astonishment when Harry took him
to Justice Higginbotham's camp. Boats were tied to the small
wharf. Boats were moored to every available spot on the shore. For
hundreds of yards about the wharf boats were anchored. Not since
he had seen a regatta had Jimmy seen so many boats in one place at
the same time.

When he stepped to the wharf and thence to the wide porch, he
understood the cause of this. As he had seen at the telegraph
office and the public telephone booths, Justice Higginbotham's
camp was now a magnet for all the newspapers and press services in
the United States and Canada. Near the wharf he recognized the
plane that had transported Professor Brierly to New York.

Chapter VIII

Jimmy recognized several of the men and women on the porch as
reporters and feature writers. These, knowing that Jimmy's paper
was the one that sprung the story, made a concerted rush for him.
He fended them off. He told them that beyond what had been printed
he knew nothing. Asked about Professor Brierly, he told them that
he had not seen the old scientist for more than fifteen hours;
that his paper in New York had handled that end. He assured them
that beyond the bare announcement over the phone that Schurman had
been murdered, he knew nothing new.

At this moment the grizzled negro came to the door of the porch
and gestured to Jimmy. He said to the reporter when Jimmy came
near him:

"The jedge, Mistuh Hale, sez for you--all to come in an' see him
and the otheh gempmen."

Aside from the eleven men he had first met the day before, there
were in the big, comfortable living-room, Professor Brierly and
District Attorney McCall. He felt and saw that all of them were
looking at him.

He was shocked at the appearance of some of the men. They seemed
to have shrunken in size. There was a furtive air about some of
them; stark fear, fear of the unknown danger, shone in the eyes of
a number of the men present.

"Mr. Hale, it is not your fault, but you are indirectly
responsible for the presence of all those men and women out there.
It is a very distressing thing. Newspapers have their place and
uses, of course; we all recognize that, but we cannot at a time
like this be besieged by a horde of men and women, not all of
whom, I regret to say, have the delicacy to show the kindness and
consideration--"

"I get you, Judge. The thing to do, of co