"Come home with me, dear," said Avelyn soothingly. "If you'll let me ask Mother, I believe she'd know what we ought to do." Pamela was very much upset, and seemed almost hysterical. Her hands trembled, and she wiped tell-tale drops from her eyes. She climbed down the ladder, padlocked the stable door again, went into the house for her hat and the history book, locked the front door, hid the key in the rockery, and pronounced herself ready to start. Avelyn was glad to have persuaded her so easily. Her own mind was in a whirl. To have found a wireless telegraphy installation in the old stable was indeed a discovery which would very seriously implicate Mr. Hockheimer. The responsibility of the knowledge was too great to be borne only by two schoolgirls; it must be shared by some older and wiser person. The friends walked silently along the road. At the corner by the oak wood they met David and Anthony. At sight of them the boys came running forward in much excitement. "We've just seen Spring-heeled Jack again!" they cried. This was indeed a piece of news. Spring-heeled Jack, who had vanished from the neighbourhood since the autumn! For the moment it even threw wireless telegraphy into the shade. "Where? When?" exclaimed the girls eagerly. "Just a minute ago. We were up the bank there after a butterfly, and he came bounding past and jumped into the wood." "Which way did he go?" Anthony pointed a stumpy finger to indicate the direction. Pamela set her teeth. "I'm going after him," she announced. The Watsons stared at her amazed. Spring-heeled Jack had been the terror of the village, and Pamela was not altogether conspicuous for courage. "I must find him! I must!" she continued. "It's the only chance of getting that lost paper!" And climbing over the palings she scrambled into the wood among the bracken. The Watsons were not a family to desert a chum. David and Anthony were after her in half a second, and Avelyn followed as quickly as her feminine skirts allowed. Her heart was beating violently. Whether the object of their search was human or spectral he was equally a cause for alarm. They could hear sounds higher up the wood. Pamela was running fast and so were the boys. There was a sudden, unearthly yell, and a dark, masked figure came bounding towards them in a series of wild leaps. Man, monkey, or bogy, it jumped with incredible speed. The boys set up a shout and dashed towards it, but it gave an enormous leap and sprang past them. It would have got clean away but for a tangled bramble bush that broke its course. The next moment it was sprawling among the bracken. The boys rushed upon it, and while David pinned it down Anthony tore off the black mask. To their utter amazement it revealed the well-known features of their friend, Captain Harper. At the sight of their blank faces he burst out laughing.