Puzzled

The clouds were black overhead and the rain " was pouring steadily as the Hardy boys hastened back up the path toward the picnic grounds. Once under the trees they were partly sheltered from the rain but in the open spaces they were thoroughly drenched. Thunder rolled continuously, lightning flashed, and the rain came in sheets.

" This ends the picnic, " panted Joe, as they ran back.

" It sure does. Everybody will be soaked."

The trees were threshing and sighing in the wind. There was a vivid flash of lightning followed immediately by a crash and a clap of thunder.

" Must have hit a tree, " said Frank.

When they came in sight of the picnic grounds, Frank saw that he had guessed correctly. Only a few yards away from the cookhouse, a great oak lay prone on the ground, a jagged fragment of the trunk sticking up out of the earth. The trunk had been sundered by the lightning and the great tree had been struck to earth.

Inside the cook-house, the boys and girls of the graduating class were huddled together. Many of them were badly frightened, for the lightning flash had come unpleasantly close, and the falling tree had missed their refuge by a scant few feet.

As Frank and Joe came racing across the sloppy ground, a cheer went up.

" Here they are! "

" Here come the Hardy boys! "

" At last! "

" Where have you two been? " shouted Chet Morton, as they dashed up onto the veranda, their clothes dripping wet. " We've been worried sick. Thought you'd got struck by lightning."

" Looks as if you people were nearer to being struck than we were, " replied Frank, looking ruefully at his drenched garments.

" We've been awfully worried, " said Callie Shaw, pressing forward. " When the storm began, everybody gathered here except you and Joe, and we had no idea where you were."

" Oh, we were just exploring around, " said Frank. " No harm done, except that we're mighty wet.''

" No harm done! " exclaimed Iola Morton.

" How about our nice picnic! It's all spoiled now! "

" Well, we were nearly ready to go home anyway, " observed Chet. He turned to the Hardy boys. " Well, you two chaps missed the best display of fireworks I've seen since last Fourth of July."

" Looks as if you had a mighty narrow escape, " said Joe.

" We certainly had. There was a flash of lightning that seemed to miss us all by about two inches, then the loudest crash of thunder I ever heard in my life, then a tearing and crackling, and we saw that big tree topple over."

" It seemed to be coming right down on top of the house, " said Callie.

" We thought we were done for. If that tree had ever hit the roof we would have been crushed to death. And that would have spoiled the picnic for sure, " added Chet.

The very real danger they had been in and the storm had dampened the spirits of the graduating class, and when the rain finally began to die down there was not a dissenting voice when Frank Hardy suggested that they make a dash for the cars. Hastily packing up the baskets, they left their refuge and ran across the grass to the cars parked out by the gate. Everyone found a place, and within a few minutes the picnic grounds were deserted.

The lull in the storm had been only temporary. Rain came down in torrents before they had gone more than half a mile along the Shore Road, and some of those in open cars who had not taken the precaution of putting up the tops, received a second drenching. Frank and Joe, in their roadster, accompanied by Callie Shaw and Iola Morton, were more fortunate, and they soon arrived on the outskirts of Bayport without mishap.

The picnic party broke up without further ceremony, the cars scattering in various directions as the boys of the class drove the girls home. Frank and Joe drove Callie to her aunt's store in Bayport and Iola decided that she would wait there for Chet, who was to drive her home that evening. In their wet clothes, the picnickers presented a sorry sight, but all in all they agreed that they had had a good time which even the thunderstorm could not spoil.

When Frank and Joe Hardy reached home and changed their clothes, their mother was sympathetic.

" It's too bad, " she said, as she prepared a hot supper for them. " You had all been counting on that picnic."

" Well, we had half a picnic, at any rate. We can be thankful for that much, " Frank observed. And then, when their mother was in the kitchen, he added to his brother: " I don't call the day wasted."

" You mean Ducroy? "

" Yes. We learned that he's up to some funny business. I'd like to know what it's all about."

" Something crooked, I'll be bound, " declared Joe.

" Ten thousand dollars apiece, he said. That's a lot of money. I'm sure Giles Ducroy and his two precious friends could never earn that much money honestly."

" It must be crooked. The big reason Ollie Jacobs and Newt Pipps objected to the scheme was because there was danger in it and they might be shot."

" Maybe they intend to rob a bank, " ventured Frank.

" I wish we knew. Still, perhaps it was all just talk. They were half drunk, you know."

" Yes, I thought of that." Frank shook his head. " Still, now that Giles Ducroy is out of work, he might be turning his hand to some kind of thievery."

" Do you think we ought to tell dad? " Joe suggested.

" Not yet. After all, those men were drinking and it might have been nothing more than drunken chatter. Perhaps Ducroy was only bragging and trying to make a big fellow of himself by telling them he could help them make so much money. We don't know what they were talking about in the first place. We'd just look foolish if we went to dad with our story and nothing came of it."

'' He couldn't do anything, anyway. No more than we can."

" All we can do, " said Frank, '" is to watch and wait."

" We'll watch, all right. We'll try to check up on Giles Ducroy and find out what he's up to. We have one big advantage-he doesn't know we overheard what they were saying in the cabin."

" He doesn't know we were within miles of the place."

" I'm puzzled about that conversation. If there was nothing in it, " said Joe, " why did they pick such an out-of-the-way spot to have their meeting? "

" It may have been because of the liquor. It's against the law to have it, " Frank pointed out. " Perhaps we were only listening in on a drinking party after all."

" I don't think so. I have a pretty strong belief that there was more than that behind it. Giles Ducroy and that other pair are a bad combination. When you see those three together it means there is some trouble being hatched."

Their mother came in just then with the tea things, so the boys turned the conversation to other matters. Mrs. Hardy wanted to know what was next on their program, now that school was over and the class picnic a thing of the past.

" Graduation exercises, " said Frank promptly. " Next week, at the high school."

" I must get a new dress, " Mrs. Hardy declared.

" You'll certainly have to get all dolled up to come and see your sons step up for their diplomas, " agreed Joe laughingly. " It only happens once in a lifetime, you know."

" I'm glad to see you graduate, but in a way I'm sorry, " confessed their mother. " It means you're growing up and you soon won't be my boys any longer."

" We'll always be your boys, even if we live to be a hundred, " declared Frank, putting an arm about his mother's waist.

" Have you decided what you want to do after the holidays are over? " she asked. " You know I've been counting on having you both go through college."

The boys looked serious.

" We'll have to think about that, " Joe said.

" Still, there's lots of time. A whole summer ahead of us."

" Be sure and think seriously about it, " their mother warned. " It is a serious matter. Your whole future will depend on your decision."

" Maybe by the end of the summer we'll feel different about going to college, " said Frank. " Just now I'm so glad to be out of school that I never want to see another study book again as long as I live."

" Me, too, " declared Joe.

Their mother smiled indulgently, and the matter of the boys' future plans rested at that.