“I wonder how long we’ll have to wait,” Bud said impatiently.
“No time at all,” Tom replied. “I think I hear my jet.”
With an eerie whistle Tom’s stolen craft whipped across the island.
A TRICKY INVENTION 199
“He’ll come in for a landing now,” Bud replied.
“I hope he doesn’t have any suspicions that we’re no longer prisoners.”
Suddenly a queer expression came over Bud’s face. “Tom, I feel-”
“The same with me,” Tom remarked. “I’m-spinning-”
His voice trailed off as he felt a paralysis spreading rapidly through his limbs.
His vision blurred and his head reeled. What had happened?
Dimly he was aware of Bud pitching to the ground. Then Tom knew the answer: Chilcote had fired on them with the pulsator!
The next second all was blackness!
CHAPTER 25
VICTORY
HOW LONG Tom lay unconscious he did not know. But when he opened his eyes he noticed that Bud also was stirring. Tom’s head felt as if it had been hit by a sledge hammer, but gradually the intense pain subsided and he sat up. Bud tried to struggle to his feet.
“What-what hit us?” he asked, still dazed.
When Tom said he thought it had been the pulsator on his stolen jet plane, Bud looked worried.
“It probably knocked out the others, too,” he said. “We’d better find out.”
But as the boys stood up they heard shouts. Mr. Swift, Uncle Ned, and Mr.
Foster were signaling from across the channel.
“Thank goodness you’re all right,” Tom cried. “Were you blacked out?”
“Blacked out?” Uncle Ned queried. “No. We came to see what happened to Chilcote.”
200
VICTORY 201