As everyone took his place, Chow tuned up hastily. Then he tucked the fiddle under his chin, stomped out the rhythm, and launched into a lively rendition of "Turkey in the Straw" while he called out the accompaniment:

"_Gals to the middle, then back so far!

Gents step up for a clockwise star!

Now shift hands and twirl t'other way, We'll keep on dancin' till the break o' day...._"

The dance number finally ended to thunderous applause. Chow, puffing and red-faced but wreathed in smiles, was soon ready for another. Half an hour later, a dance band of high school boys, hastily summoned by Sandy, arrived to spell the Texan.

The irrepressible chef, however, continued to call out most of the numbers and proved to be the hero of the evening. He gained even more acclaim for his delicious French fried potatoes and "steerburgers"

served during the pause for refreshments.

"Oh, Chow! What would we ever do without you?" Sandy said, and the cook beamed.

Suddenly, in the midst of the lively chatter and laughter, the dance floor was plunged into total darkness!

Phyl clung fearfully to her escort. "Tom!" she gasped. "This is another trick of your enemy's to harm you!"

CHAPTER XII

DETECTION TEST

"Don't worry, Phyl. It may be only a blown fuse," Tom tried to a.s.sure the fearful girl.

But Tom was worried himself. Not only might he be in danger, but it could involve his friends!

Nevertheless, he raised his voice above the excited babble. "Please be calm, everyone! We'll have the lights on again in a jiffy!"

Taking Phyl by the hand, Tom groped his way toward the main door.

"Let's check the switch," he murmured, and ran his hand over the wall near the door. He located the metal plate and flipped the switch.

The lights went on! Good-natured cheers arose. Bud, grinning but puzzled, left Sandy's side long enough to come over and speak to Tom.

"What happened?"

"I guess some practical joker clicked off the switch."

Bud suddenly caught sight of a stout youth in a plaid shirt and blue jeans, who was standing in a nearby corner. He was shaking all over with half-stifled merriment.

"There's the wise guy! Rock Harriman!"

Rock, an all-star tackle on the Shopton High football team, was well known for his pranks and practical jokes. Bud rushed over.

"Okay! Confess!" the husky young flier roared in a jokingly ferocious tone.

"Don't get sore!" Rock gasped between chuckles. "I couldn't resist. Boy, did you hear everyone squeal when the lights went out?"

Tom grinned in relief. "How about another dance, Phyl?"

As the music struck up again, he squeezed Phyl's hand. "I sure appreciate your concern, even if I didn't rate it."

Phyl blushed as she returned the squeeze. "You rate with me," she confided shyly.

The festivities finally ended after a thoroughly enjoyable evening. Both Sandy and Phyl declared to their dates that it more than made up for the forgotten beach party.

"But let's not wait too long for the next date," Sandy warned playfully.

"Okay, that's a deal," Bud promised.

The next morning at the plant Tom called on Harlan Ames. He told of the sinister hoax by the caller who had pa.s.sed himself off as Lester Morris.

The security chief promised to investigate.

"I'll tip off the police about Len Unger," Ames added. "If they can find him, we may be able to crack this case wide open."

Tom telephoned Bud, Hank Sterling, and Arv Hanson to meet him at the helijet hangar. The four took off in one of the Swifts' Whirling Ducks, which was standing by loaded and ready. Soon they landed on Fearing Island, where Tom would try out his antidetection invention.

"What'll we use for a test sub, skipper?" Hank asked as they drove toward the docks.

"A jetmarine," Tom replied.

A truck with engineers and technicians was following the jeep. It carried the equipment which Tom and Bud had a.s.sembled the previous day.

When they arrived at the docks, Tom gathered the men in a loading shed.

He showed them his drawings and explained how his "sonar-blinding" setup would operate.

"Don't let the diagrams fool you. The basic idea is very simple. We absorb all sonar impulses that hit the ship and transmit them out the opposite side of the hull, instead of letting a ping bounce back and show up on the sonarscope of any hostile sub on the lookout for us."

Most of the job, he went on, would be tedious detail work. It would consist of attaching hundreds of mikes and speakers all over the hull to pick up and transmit the sonar pulses. The mikes would be receiving transducers and the speakers would be transmitting transducers.

"The leads from them," Tom ended, "will be centralized in a single electronic control unit inside the ship. I'll handle that part of it."

"Great idea, Tom!" Arv Hanson said admiringly.

"But what a job it'll be rigging those transducers," put in one of the technicians.

Tom nodded wryly. "You're right, Danny. If this experiment works out, though, I think I can lick that problem on future installations."

The young inventor explained that he hoped to find a way to mold the transducers into a continuous plastic sheet. This could be applied to the hull of a submarine in a single operation.

"But this time we'll have to do it the hard way," Tom added with an apologetic grin.

A jetmarine was hoisted into drydock and the work crew swarmed over it, rigging the transducers. Would his experiment succeed? Tom wondered.

Hopefully, he set to work a.s.sembling the electronic control unit.

Bud helped the men on the hull for a while, then descended through the hatch to see how Tom was progressing.