"Tell us," pleaded several.

"Yes, throw some light on the dark mystery," added Lil Artha, "because
to the untrained eye it's all as gloomy as the inside of my pocket. A
comb, and how to tell a woman's age from that! Well, I own up beat."

"Why, it's as easy as falling off a log, or coming down in a smash when
you're first learning how to fly," Matty began.

"Hey, don't you drag me into this thing," spoke up Toby, whose many
experiments as a new beginner in the science of aviation had usually
ended in his enjoying a disastrous tumble.

"All you have to do is to examine the comb," Matty went on. "Then you'll
find that it holds a few long hairs, and, fellows, just see how gray
they are, will you?"

"Well, what d'ye think of that!" burst out Red. "And I guess we're a lot
of chumps, fellows, not to have seen through it before."

"Would a woman be among anarchists, Elmer?" demanded Toby.

"Oh, I don't know," came the reply. "Perhaps so, though not as a usual
thing. But understand that I haven't said I agreed with you altogether,
when you gave such a hard name to these people."

"Then you don't count 'em as Black Hand kidnapers, who expect to raise a
bully good sum by holding our pard, Nat Scott, for ransom?" demanded
Red.

"I've seen nothing to tell me that's the way matters stand," Elmer
commenced saying, "and several things seem to say just the opposite. The
presence of the woman, and her having such an article as this precious
string of beads don't seem to go along with such a thing as a band of
rascals."

"Yes, yes, go on, Elmer," several called out.

"We haven't found the slightest sign of a bomb factory here, or even a
book teaching how to bring about a revolution. These things make me
believe that these three men and a woman may not be such terribly hard
cases after all."

"But you believe they've got our chum, and are holding him a prisoner,
don't you, Elmer?" asked Matty.

"I do believe it," Elmer went on. "In fact I know it, because if you
look back of that empty box yonder, which they use for a table, you'll
find a hat--Nat's hat, if I'm not mistaken."

A rush was made for the box in question, and there followed a confusion
of tongues, as half a dozen fellows tried to talk at once.

"You found a hat, didn't you?" demanded Elmer.

"We sure did, and here she is," cried Red, holding up the article in
question.

"It looks like a scout's regulation hat?" Elmer remarked.

"Which nobody could deny,