Colonel Tempest was almost at his wits’ end. He sorely needed the help of his able assistants. He wanted to send them out east to chase this daring brigand off the trade routes. He was unable also to comply with the request for assistance, when at length it did reach him, for all his best fighting men, with the exception of these two in the Black Forest, had been sent after the raider. He promised, however, to come personally at the earliest possible moment, as soon as matters had been cleared up a little. Again and again Keane tried to reach him with brief, but urgent coded messages, for he was now getting extremely anxious lest the raider should appear before they were ready. Sharpe, however, who was eminently practical, had taken the professor’s own tip, and had laid wires across the glade, which, when properly connected up, would make it a dangerous proceeding for a hostile aeroplane to land there, while, in the event of a friendly one appearing, the current could be immediately switched off. He had seen to the prisoners as well, for, unknown to Keane, he had, on the first signs of awakening, given to each of them a sufficiently strong soporific to extend the period of their quiescence for a considerably longer period, so that, late that afternoon, his friend was somewhat alarmed at their quietude. That night they watched in turns, and relieved each other every two hours. When morning came they climbed the highest trees and scanned the horizon in every direction for the promised help, and also for the _Scorpion_. But although the column of smoke from the fire which had been lighted, ascended all day in one long grey streak to guide the British airmen, yet morning wore on to afternoon, and no assistance came. Keane sent message after message, but apparently to no purpose. The very heavens were full of messages, for the whole civilized world had been roused by the last daring feat of the phantom airman. London, Paris, Cairo, Delhi and New York were clamouring for his immediate capture and execution. Strong things, too, were being said about the incapacity of the much vaunted aerial police, but all the world realised that the task before these men was almost superhuman. Twice an urgent message came recalling the two Englishmen, but Keane replied with the one word, "Impossible!" And all this time the raider, who was carefully hiding for a few days, delighted his companions by retailing with much gusto such of these messages as he had been able to piece together from the aerial jumble. "Let them send all their available machines and pilots out east," he had said to Carl and Max, "then we will quietly slip across Europe to Ireland, where everything is ripe for the promised revolution." "And the Schwarzwald?" queried Max. "Oh, we will call there for a few hours en route," replied the pirate, calmly relighting his pipe, "The professor will understand our silence and inactivity."