hink,
I lay down to rest among some bushes. Ten minutes after I'd got there a
boat rowed by some persons came along. They beached it right alongside
the brush. Then one of them, a boy, lifted a mail bag from the bottom of
the skiff."

"A mail bag--- a boy?" repeated Andy, with a start of intelligence. "Did
you hear his name?"

"Yes, in a talk that followed. The man with him called him Jim."

"Jim Tapp," murmured Andy.

"He called the man Murdock."

"I thought so," Andy said to himself. "They put up that mail robbery."

"They cut open the bag and took out a lot of letters," continued Luke.
"A few of them had money in them. This they pocketed, tearing up the
letters and throwing them into the creek. There was one letter the boy
kept. He read it over and over. When they had got through with the
letters, he said to the man that it was funny."

"What was funny?" asked Andy.

"Why, he said there was a letter putting him on to 'a big spec.,' as he
called it. He said the letter told about a secret, about a fortune the
writer had discovered. He said the letter was to a boy who would never
know his good luck if they didn't tell him. He said to the man there was
something to think over. He chuckled as he bragged how they would make a
big stake juggling the fortune of the heir, Andy Wildwood."

"I don't understand it at all," said Andy, "but it is a singular story,
for a fact."

"Well, that's all I know about it. The minute I heard your name, of
course I recalled where I had heard it before."

"Of course," nodded Andy thoughtfully.

After that the conversation lagged. Luke soon fell asleep. For over two
hours, however, Andy kept trying to figure out how he could possibly be
an heir, who had written the letter, and to whom it had been addressed.

The next day they arrived at Baltimore. A morning paper contained a
dispatch from Lacon.

The circus men had nearly killed half-a-dozen of the mob of roughs. The
police had restored order, but fire and riot had put the show out
of business.

Miss Starr wired to the town in Delaware where the Big Show was playing.
Luke had gone on to join it. By noon she received a satisfactory reply.
Then she telegraphed to Lacon about their traps, directing the manager
where to send them.

That evening, after a long talk over their prospects, the four refugees
took the train for Dover.

The next morning Miss Starr, Billy, Midget and Andy went to the
headquarters of The Biggest Show o