lack of good food, soon made him ill. He was so weak
that he could not help himself, and with that he was kept under
guard. So he had no chance to escape or send his wife or friends
any word.

"But I'm all right now, Tom, thanks to you!" said he. "Bless my
pocketbook, I don't care if my fortune is lost, as long as I'm
alive and can get back to my wife."

"But I don't believe your fortune will be lost," said Tom. "I
think I have the picture and other evidence that will save it,"
and he told of his photo telephone, and of what it had accomplished.

"Bless my eyelashes!" cried Mr. Damon. "What a young man you are,
Tom Swift!"

Tom smiled gladly. He knew now that his old friend was himself
once more.

There is little left to tell. Chance had aided Tom in a most
wonderful way--chance and the presence of Mr. Halling with his
airship at just the right moment.

Tom made a diligent effort to find out who it was that had
chloroformed him in the telephone booth that time, but learned
nothing definite. Peters and Boylan were both examined as to this
on their trials, but denied it, and the young inventor was forced
to conclude that it must have been some of the unscrupulous men
who had taken his father's patent some time before.

"They may have heard of your prosperity, and thought it a good
chance to rob you," suggested Ned.

"Maybe," agreed Tom. "Well, we'll let it go at that. Only I hope
they don't come again."

Mr. Damon was soon home with his wife again, and Peters and Boylan
were held in heavy bail. They had secreted most of Mr. Damon's
wealth, falsely telling him it was lost, and they were forced to
give back his fortune. The evidence against them was clear and
conclusive. When Tom went into court with his phonograph record of
the talk of Peters, even though the man's voice was hoarse from a
cold when he talked, and when his picture was shown, in the
telephone booth, the jury at once convicted him.

Boylan, when he learned of the missing button in Tom's possession,
confessed that he and some of his men who were birdmen had taken
Tom's airship. They wanted a means of getting Mr. Damon to the
lonely house without being traced, and they accomplished it.

As Tom had surmised, Peters had become suspicious after his last
talk with Mrs. Damon, and had fled. He disguised himself and went
into hiding with the others at the lonely house. Then he learned
that the authorities of another city, where he had swindled many,