rned away.

"What do you suppose he means, Andy?" asked Pete Bailey, one of Andy's
cronies.

"It means he's got electrical wires strung around his place," declared
Sam Snedecker, "and that we'll be shocked if we go up there. I'm not
going!"

"Me, either," added Pete, and Andy laughed uneasily.

Tom heard what they said, and in the next few days he made himself busy
by putting some heavy wires in and about the grounds where they would
show best. But the wires carried no current, and were only displayed to
impress a sense of fear on Andy and his cronies, which purpose they
served well.

But it was like locking the stable door after the horse had been
stolen, for with all the precautions he could take Tom could not get
back his plans, and he spent many anxious days seeking them. They
seemed to have completely disappeared, however, and the young inventor
decided there was nothing else to do but to draw new ones.

He set to work on them, and in the meanwhile tried to learn whether or
not Andy had the missing plans. He sought this information by stealth,
and was aided by his chum, Ned Newton. But all to no purpose. Not the
slightest trace or clue was discovered.

Chapter Five

Building the Sky Racer

"What will you do, if, after you have your little monoplane all
constructed, and get ready to race, you find that some one else has one
exactly like it at the meet?" asked Ned Newton one day, when he and Tom
were out in the big workshop, talking things over. "What will you do,
Tom?"

"I don't see that there is anything I can do. I'll go on to the meet,
of course, and trust to some improvements I have since brought out, and
to what I know about aeroplanes, to help me win the race. I'll know,
too, who stole my plans."

"But it will be too late, then."

"Yes, too late, perhaps, to stop them from using the drawings, but not
too late to punish them for the theft. It's a great mystery, and I'll
be on the anxious seat all the while. But it can't be helped."

"When are you going to start work on the sky racer?"

"Pretty soon, now. I've got another set of plans made, and I've fixed
them so that if they are stolen it won't do any one any good."

"How's that?"

"I've put in a whole lot of wrong figures and measurements, and scores
of lines and curves that mean nothing. I have marked the right figures
and lines by a secret mark, and when I work on them I'll use only the
proper ones. But any one else wouldn't kno