CHAPTER I

SOMETHING QUEER

“Ours is sure a great plant!” murmured Tom Swift to himself, with
justifiable pride. “It would be a credit to anybody. No wonder dad loves
it, and so do I. Yes, it sure is a great plant! We’ve had our
troubles—our ups and downs—and our enemies have tried their hardest to
wipe it out.”

Darkness was slowly gathering over the landscape, shrouding in velvety
black the trees which were faintly stirring in the summer breeze. Tom,
following an old-time cowpath across the green meadow on his way home
from town, topped a little rise and caught a glimpse of the high board
fence surrounding the Swift Construction Company’s plant which he and
his father had built up after many years of hard work.

Tom paused for a moment to trace, in the fast-gathering shadows of the
night, the outlines of the various buildings—the foundry, the
wood-working mill, the electrical shop, the hangars where many types of
aircraft were housed.

From some of the tall chimneys faint clouds of smoke arose, for certain
of the industries carried on by the Swift Construction Company required
that furnaces be kept going day and night.

“A great plant—a wonderful plant!” mused Tom. It gave him a certain
sense of pleasure to dwell thus in introspection on the accomplishments
of his father and himself. And it buoyed him up for the work in
prospect—for Tom Swift had a great plan in mind, a plan so great and
daring that, as yet, he had said but little of it even to his father or
to Ned Newton, his old chum who was now an officer of the concern.

“But it can be done! I know it can be done!” declared Tom. “And I’m
going to do it! I’m going to——”

In his mental energy he had unconsciously spoken the last words in a low
voice, but the sight of something just ahead of him in the gathering
darkness caused him to break off abruptly and halt suddenly.
Concentrating his gaze, Tom Swift looked eagerly at a clump of bushes.

“It’s a man,” murmured Tom Swift. “A man, sure enough, and it isn’t one
of our workers, either. None of them would sneak around as he is doing.”

For that described exactly the movements of the stranger of whom Tom had
caught sight in the darkness as he approached the big fence which
surrounded his plant.

“What’s he up to?” mused Tom. “No good, that’s sure. He wouldn’t sneak
along like that if he were on the level.”

Through Tom’s mind flashed remembrances of times when attempts had been
made by enemies of himself and his father to fire the plant. To prevent
this, and to keep strangers away, a high fence had been erected around
the buildings. This fence was protected by wires on the plan of a
burglar alarm, so that, no matter at what point the barrier was climbed,
a bell would ring in the main office and on an indicator would appear a
number to show at what part of the fence an attempt was being made to
scale it.

An effort to break down the barrier, or burrow beneath it, would also
sound the alarm in like manner. So Tom had no fear that the sneaking
stranger, crouching along in the darkness, could get into the midst of
the buildings without notice being given.

“But what’s his game?” thought Tom.

Almost at the instant he asked himself this question he saw the man
crawl behind a clump of bushes. In the natural course of events the man
should have appeared on the other side of the clump. But he did nothing
of the sort.

“He may be hiding there,” mused Tom. “Perhaps waiting for a confederate.
I’ll just have a closer look at this!”

He advanced boldly toward the bushes. There was nothing between him and
the shrubbery, and it was still light enough to see fairly well.
Besides, Tom had extraordinarily good eyes. His astonishment can be
imagined when, on reaching the bush off which he had not taken his gaze
and behind which he had seen the crawling man disappear he found—no
one!

“That’s the queerest thing I’ve seen yet!” exclaimed Tom, rubbing his
organs of vision.

Standing beside the bush which came about to his shoulders, Tom looked
on all sides of it. There was no hollow in the ground, as far as he
could make out, no depression and no other clumps of shrubbery and no
boulders behind which a man might be hidden. Some distance away there
were all of these things in profusion, for the land was wild and
uncultivated outside the plant fence. But there was not a hole, boulder,
or bush near enough to the one beside which Tom stood to have enabled a
man to gain their protection while the young inventor was watching.

“He just crawled back of his bush and then vanished!” said Tom, in a
half whisper to himself. “If only I had a flashlight now——” He was
startled by hearing some one walking toward him out of the darkness
which was now quite dense. “Here he comes!” thought Tom. “Appearing as
queerly as he disappeared. Or else it’s one of his confederates.” He
could see no one, and his hand clutched something in his pocket that
might be used in case he was attacked.

But a moment later, just as Tom’s nerves and muscles were getting tense
in anticipation of a struggle, a cheery whistle broke out in the
darkness, mingling with the now louder sounds of the footsteps, and Tom,
with a cry of relief, called:

“That you, Ned?”

“Sure, old scout!” was the reply. “Oh, there you are!” went on Ned
Newton, as he caught sight of Tom at the same moment the young inventor
glimpsed his friend and financial manager.

“You’re a bit late,” went on Ned. “I waited for you, and when you didn’t
show up I thought I might as well walk in toward town and maybe I’d meet
you.”

“Yes, I couldn’t get just what I wanted until I had tried two or three
places,” Tom answered. “And then I met a man——”

Ned broke into a laugh.

“What’s the idea?” Tom wanted to know.

“Tell that to Mary!” advised his chum. “She may believe that and then
you can tell her another.”

“Whew!” shrilly whistled Tom. “I forgot all about Mary. I promised to
call on her to-night.”

“Sure you did,” laughed Ned. “And I’ve got a date with Helen. You said
we’d go over together and——”

“Clean forgot it!” broke in Tom. “And I can’t go now. I’ve got something
to do.” Quickly he made up his mind to say nothing to Ned of what he had
seen until he investigated a little on his own account. “Here, I tell
you what to do,” went on Tom. “Go on, keep your date with Helen, but
when you get to her house telephone to Mary for me and say I’ll be a
little late. Will you?”

“Pull your chestnuts out of the fire? Is that it, Tom? I reminded you
myself before supper!” laughed Ned. “Well, I don’t mind, for you’ve done
the same for me. I guess Mary Nestor knows you by this time, or, if she
doesn’t, she never will. But what’s the big idea?”

“Oh, I’ve just got a notion in my head,” said Tom. “I want to go to the
office a moment to jot down some memoranda before I forget them. ’Phone
Mary I’ll be over as soon as I can. See you later.”

“Cheek!” exclaimed Ned, and with his merry whistle he hurried off in the
darkness. “I only hope Mary speaks to you when you finally get to see
her,” floated back to Tom.

“Don’t you worry about Mary,” advised the young inventor. “I’ll explain
to her. And tell her I’ll be along in about half an hour. I really
forgot all about the engagement.”

“I’ll say you did!” playfully mocked Ned.

Then, with his chum out of the way, Tom gave himself to trying to solve
the mystery. For mystery he believed it to be. Seeing a man step behind
a bush and, on arriving at the bush, to find nothing of the man there
was surprising, to say the least.

Sensing that it would soon be so dark that it would be useless to
investigate without an illuminant of some sort, Tom made haste to gain
what advantage he could from the fast-fading light. He looked sharply
about without moving from his place behind the bush on the other side of
which he had seen the man disappear. Then, as he could pick up here no
clew to the strange happening, the young inventor moved around to the
other side.

The light was a little better here and Tom saw something that made him
fairly gasp with astonishment. He had moved somewhat away from the bush
and almost at his feet was an opening in the ground.

“This explains it!” murmured Tom, half aloud. “A hole in the ground! He
went down there. I knew he couldn’t have dug himself in as quickly as
that. But that hole! I never saw it before. It isn’t any of our doing.
I’d have known about it if it were.”

All the land there belonged to Tom and his father. It was a big field
surrounding the fenced-in plant, and often the smooth part of the field
was used as a landing place for aeroplanes.

Cautiously approaching the opening in the ground and wondering more and
more how it had gotten there without his knowledge, Tom saw that it had
been closed by some planks placed over it. These were now tossed to one
side, as if they had been hurriedly displaced. Scattered about was loose
earth which had evidently covered the planks, thus hiding them from the
view of a casual observer.

“A secret opening!” murmured Tom. “This is certainly the queerest thing
I’ve ever seen! What does it mean?”

His surprise increased when, as he drew near to the edge of the opening,
he saw a rough flight of plank steps going down into the hole. The young
man caught his breath sharply, it was so astounding. But with Tom Swift
to see and think was to act, and a moment later he began a descent of
the steps into the mysterious hole. It might have been the part of
discretion to wait until daylight, but a secret opening like this, so
near the Swift plant, could mean but one thing, Tom reasoned.

“Some one is trying to put up a game on us,” he decided. “Unknown to us
he has made a tunnel under our plant. There’s something funny here! I’m
going to see what it is.”

Tom had fairly to feel his way down the flight of plank steps. They were
rough and uneven, but solidly built. The young inventor counted them as
he descended so he would know how to come back. Now that his head was
below the level of the ground it was so dark that it was as if a velvet
robe had been wrapped about him.

He counted ten steps down, and was cautiously feeling about with his
right foot extended to ascertain if there were any more, when suddenly
he felt the presence of some one near him. He caught the sound of breath
fiercely drawn in, as if his unknown and unseen companion, there in the
darkness, was nerving himself for an attack.

Instinctively Tom drew back, his hands pressed to the planked sides of
the opening down which he had descended. He could feel, rather than see,
some one leaning toward him. A sweet, sickening odor came to his
nostrils. He felt a hand pressed over his face—a hand that held a damp
rag which gave off that overpowering perfume.

“Here! What’s this? Who—who——” But Tom Swift’s voice became a mere
gurgle in his throat. His legs became limp. His head whirled and he
seemed lifted up and carried through measureless miles of space on the
wings of some great bird.

Then Tom’s senses left him. He knew no more.