“Let me go! Let me go!” cried this individual. He tried to get something out of his pocket, but Koku held his hand until other watchmen came with lights, and then it was seen that the prisoner was Schlump. An ugly sight he was, too, his face inflamed with rage. Koku pulled his hand from the pocket and found that Schlump was clutching a deadly bomb with a time fuse which shortly would have set it off. But some of the mechanics soon rendered the infernal machine harmless, and Schlump was taken before Tom. “So, we’ve caught you, have we?” asked the young inventor. “So it seems!” Schlump snarled. “But you’d better try to save yourself! The others are still after you! I’m not the only one! And you haven’t got me yet—not quite!” With an unexpected and quick motion he broke away from Koku and ran off in the darkness. CHAPTER XXIV TROUBLES AND WORRIES Instantly the scene just outside the hangar where the plane and the car were kept was in confusion. So quickly had Schlump given his captor the slip that, for a moment, every one was stunned. Even Tom Swift, accustomed as he was to emergencies, did not know what to do. But this hesitation was only momentary. “Get him!” shouted the young inventor. “We’ve got to get him! Scatter and round him up!” “Turn on the searchlight!” yelled Ned. “By golly!” chuckled Eradicate, who had seen the man get away from the giant, “dat big man ain’t so smart whut he t’ink he am.” “Never mind that now, Rad!” ordered Tom, a bit sternly. “Forget your fights with Koku and see if you can find this fellow! We want to question him and see if we can’t get on the trail of the masked men and others who are trying to queer my plans!” “Yes, sah,” humbly answered the colored man. “I’ll cotch him!” But this was more easily said than done. Though the big searchlight was flashed on, its beams crossing and recrossing the field about the hangar like a giant’s finger, the plotter was not picked up. The chances were greatly in his favor, running off in the darkness as he had, and after an hour’s search it became evident that he was not to be caught. “Come back,” Tom advised his friends and the workmen. “We’ll have to let him go,” he added, as they made their way back to their temporary headquarters. “We got the bomb away from him, and we’ll take care that he doesn’t approach near enough the remainder of the night to plant another. We’ll have to organize a patrol, Ned.” “I guess that’s right,” assented the financial manager. “We can’t take any chances.” Reluctantly Koku gave up the search, for he felt it was his fault that Schlump had escaped. “Nex’ time I sot on him!” declared the giant. “He’ll be like a pancake when you get up,” chuckled Ned.