Early next morning Geoffrey sought Marius Lund and related what he had seen, whereupon they both went to the railway station, and having interviewed the stationmaster, the bag was obtained, and on opening it with a skeleton key, it was found to contain several portions of apparatus for wireless transmission.
“Well,” remarked Geoffrey, when he examined the contents of the suit-case, “I can’t see how they can transmit from that café. They have no aerial.”
“We will investigate before long,” said the police director, closing the bag and relocking it.
Within an hour Geoffrey accompanied him to the café, a dingy little place to which no one apparently went. They had previously discovered that it was kept by a man named Vedel, whose nationality was inscribed upon the municipal register as German.
As they entered, leaving four police agents in plain clothes outside, the man Vedel came forth, and behind him the second man whom Geoffrey had seen during the night.
The police director demanded to know where their secret wireless station was situated, but they at once denied possessing one.
“We shall search this place,” said Marius Lund. “You may as well tell us the truth at once.”
“Search--and welcome,” was Vedel’s defiant reply.
Hence, while the pair were prevented from leaving the premises, they searched the whole house and went out upon the roof, but found not the slightest trace of a wireless installation.
In chagrin Geoffrey began to wonder what the police thought of the mare’s nest he had discovered, when Vedel, believing that he was about to be arrested, gave himself away by drawing a revolver and firing a shot point blank at Geoffrey, narrowly missing him.
In a flash the police agents secured and disarmed him, while Lund also ordered the immediate arrest of his companion--who gave the name of Köbke--and both were hurried off to the police bureau.
The wireless engineer, Petersen, was at once telephoned for, and together they made a second examination of the premises, when after nearly an hour they found in the cellar a concealed door which led into a second cellar beneath a courtyard behind the house, wherein stood a small printing office.
In this subterranean chamber beneath the printing office they found a fine continuous-wave transmission set of one-and-a-half kilowatt power, together with its generator. Apparently the printing office had been established as a blind, so that the neighbours should believe the noise to be that of printing machinery.