Skippy grinned. "I doped out a little about him--maybe I can dope out the rest, huh?" "Here's hopin', kid," Timmy said smiling. "Anyways, even if you don't, maybe when I find what's what an' get shipped west--maybe I can tip off the bulls so's you guys won't have no killin' jobs to do when Devlin puts the bee on you. It'd be better to go to Delafield an' get a couple years off on good behavior than be in the spot I'm in tonight." "Yeah," said Nickie thoughtfully, "that's callin' the shot, Timmy. Even my full stretch'd be better'n what I'd get for goin' along with Devlin. Anyways, it ain't no bad idea to tip off the dicks if you can." "You speak crazy!" Biff interrupted. "Timmy teep off, yes, but where he tell them deecks to find us, eh? Do we know where we are, eh?" The looks they exchanged were an admission of defeat. After all, did Timmy know where he had been this past month and a half--did any of them in that damp, shadowy room have the slightest idea where the lonely house was situated? New York State? New Jersey? Pennsylvania? They might have been in the vast, trackless wilderness of Africa, so cleverly had Devlin concealed from them the location of that dismal house. Skippy was reminded then of the boy Tucker about whom Mr. Conne had told him. Tucker hadn't known either where the house was located in which Devlin had kept him imprisoned for a full month. There was something very painstaking in Devlin's methods. He either completely confused his reform school "protégés" by taking them to live in a house and street which had its counterpart in hundreds of other houses and streets or else he confounded them utterly by driving them deep into this swampy wilderness under cover of night. What were they to do? An idea came to Skippy--why not write a letter and give it to Timmy to mail? In the next second, he was thankful that the impulse hadn't flourished under cold reasoning for he suddenly realized that Devlin would be just the man to anticipate that sort of thing and Timmy would be relieved of any such messages immediately. Also, he was reminded of Carlton Conne's warning: "Get in touch with no one, kid--tell no one _anything_ unless you're certain that it's one of my men ... it's the only way that Dean Devlin can ever be caught ... and your job, kid, is to help me set the trap!" _His job--to help set the trap!_ What was he to do? He was still asking himself that when Frost came into the back yard in the noisy, ancient car. Devlin had preceded him in the closed car and was already locking it up in the barn. "Looks like they took the junk pile to get the big guy's closed car, hah?" Nickie said, not exactly at ease. Timmy was looking over his shoulder, watching through the shutters the backyard scene under Devlin's powerful flashlight. "Looks like I'm gonna ride in the junk pile tonight," he said simply. "I wonder why, hey?"