Koku handed over the attachment, for which his master had sent him.  He held it out on a couple of fingers, as one might a penknife, but Tom took both hands to set it on the ground.

“I the female get, also,” went on Koku, as he began taking some letters and papers from his pocket.  “I stop in the office post, and the female get.”

“Mail, Koku, not female,” corrected Tom with a laugh.  “A female is a lady you know.”

“For sure I know, and the lady in the post office gave me the female.  That is I said what, did I not?”

“Well, I guess you meant it all right,” remarked Ned.  “But letter mail and a male man and a female woman are all different.”

“Oh such a language!” gasped the giant.  “I shall never learn it.  Well, then, Mr. Tom, here is your mail, that the female lady gave to me for you, and you are a male.  It is very strange.”

Koku pulled out a bundle of letters, which Tom took, and then the giant continued to delve for more.  One of the papers, rolled in a wrapper, stuck on the edge of the pocket.

“You must outcome!” exclaimed Koku, giving it a sudden yank, and it “outcame” with such suddenness that the paper was torn in half, tightly wrapped as it was, and it was considerable of a bundle.

“Koku, you’re getting too strong!” exclaimed Tom, as scraps of paper were scattered about the room.  “I think I’ll give you less to eat.”

“I am your forgiveness,” said Koku humbly, as he stooped over to pick up the fragments.  “I did not mean.”

“It’s all right,” said Tom kindly.  “That’s only a big bundle of Sunday papers I guess.”

“I’ll give him a hand,” volunteered Ned, stooping over to help Koku clear the rug of the litter.  As he did so Tom’s chum gave a gasp of surprise.

“Hello, Tom!” Ned cried.  “Here’s something new, and I guess it will interest you.”

“What is it?”

“It’s part of an account of some daring smugglers who are working goods across the Canadian border into the northern part of this state.  The piece is torn, but there’s something here which says the government agents suspect the men of using airships to transport the stuff.”

“Airships!  Smugglers using airships!” cried Tom.  “It doesn’t seem possible!”

“That’s what it says here, Tom.  It says the custom house authorities have tried every way to catch them, and when they couldn’t land ’em, the only theory they could account for the way the smuggling was going on was by airships, flying at night.”

“That’s odd.  I wonder how it would seem to chase a smuggler in an airship at night?  Some excitement about that; eh, Ned?  Let’s see that scrap of paper.”

Ned passed it over, and Tom scanned it closely.  Then in his turn, he uttered an exclamation of surprise.

“What is it?” inquired his chum.