ere had been a hot discussion over a sheet of
paper that lay on the table in front of the three men in the back room.
"Rickey" had called a messenger boy and sent him out for a geography. "I
told you there wasn't any such thing there," the saloon-keeper heard
him say triumphantly, when the geography arrived. Then Fred replied: "To
h-ll with you and your schoolbook! I tell you I've waded across it." The
colonel smoothed things over and it ended in a magnum of champagne being
ordered.

"For which the colonel paid?" asked Average Jones.

"Why, yes, he did," assented the saloon man. "He said, 'Well, it's a go,
then. Here's luck to us!' He was a good spender, the colonel."

"And you haven't seen any of them since, I suppose?"

"Nary a one."

On his return to the Hoff mansion the investigator found the head
thereof in a state of great excitement.

"Say, I've found out something," he cried. "Roddy's gone to Yurrup."

"Where did you find that out?" asked Average Jones with a smile.

"I been going through his papers like you told me. He's been outfitting
for a trip. Bought lots of truck the last few days and I found the
duplicate sale-checks that come in the packages. There's stubs for
a steamer rug and for a dope for seasickness and for a compass," he
concluded triumphantly.

"Compass, eh?" observed Average Jones thoughtfully. "Ship's compass is
good enough for most of us going to Europe. Anything else?"

"Lot of clothes."

"What kind of clothes?"

"Cheap stuff mostly. Khaki riding-pants, neglyjee shirts and such-like."

"Not much suggestion of Europe there. What more?"

Doctor Hoff consulted a list. "Colored glasses."

"That looks like desert travel."

"Aneroid barometer."

"Mountain climbing."

"Permanganate of potash outfit."

"Snake country," commented the other.

"Patent water-still."

Average Jones leaned forward. "How big?"

"Don't know. Cost twenty dollars."

"Little one, then. That means about three people. Taken with the
compass, it means a small-boat trip on salt water."

"Small boat nothin'!" retorted the other. "His doctor met me this
morning an' told me Roddy had sent for him and ast him a lot of
questions about eatin' aboard ship and which way to have his berth made
up, and all that."

"A small-boat trip following a sea trip, then. What else have you
found?"

"Nothin' much. Mosquito nettin', pills, surgeon's plaster and odds and
ends of drugs."

"Let me see the drug list."