On second thought, however, he paused. Perhaps hoboes now and then used the abandoned shack for sleeping quarters. It couldn’t be very comfortable, but it would be better than sleeping outside in the damp ocean air. Although Eddie had no desire to meet any hobo, it was hardly reason to run away in a panic. Without making any sound, and glad that Sandy was off exploring in the brush, Eddie sought one of the larger cracks in the door. Leaning toward it, he put one eye to the crack. It was then that Eddie’s fear took a firm grip on him. A small candle burned on an empty fruit crate standing in the middle of the shack’s single room. In one corner was an old double bunk, empty now of mattresses or bedding. A couple of rickety chairs and a bench completed what furniture was inside the shack. Eddie’s eye was attracted by the glint of candlelight upon metal. Squinting through the crack, he was able to make out the form of the reflecting object. It was one of those metal tubes—like the one he had noticed in the bottom of the strangers’ rowboat that day at the cove. On the floor was a square battery camp lantern such as hunters often use. There was one person in the room. He sat on the small bench. His back was partly turned toward Eddie. He appeared to be studying some kind of a paper, although Eddie could see only a small corner of it. There was no mistaking the man, although his face was turned away. It was the chubby fellow named Roy Benton. There was nothing more to see. Eddie backed carefully away from the door. A few yards away, he turned and scrambled back along the darkening path toward the cove, as Sandy came crashing through the brush to meet him. CHAPTER EIGHT A lot of trouble might have been saved if things had worked out as Eddie had planned. And, yet, if they had, the mystery of the missing blueprints and the stolen radioisotope might never have been cleared up. Hurrying home through the darkness, Eddie went over in his mind the story he would tell his father. Perhaps it didn’t mean a thing. Perhaps his imagination simply was running wild, as his father had hinted. He had to admit to himself that he was prone to build rather normal incidents into deep mysteries. He had always been that way. Even allowing for that, however, Eddie still believed there was a strong possibility that the events of the past weeks might tie in with the stolen radioisotope; perhaps even with the missing blueprints from Acme Aviation. Right in the middle of those events the figures of the two men—Simms and Roy Benton—kept looming up in his mind. Anyway, he thought he should tell his father about it and let him decide whether there could be any possible connection. It was not, however, to be that way. Upon arriving home well after dark, Eddie found his mother both irked and worried over his late return.