cket and held it out to the
Captain. It was a key of peculiar construction, evidently made of
individual pattern. In fact, it was such a key as usually goes with a
strong cash box, having no duplicate.

"This was not used to open the suitcase?" he asked.

"Certainly not," was the reply. "Where did you find that?"

"On the river bank, where the canoe the men came in was beached," was
the reply.

"Well," observed the Captain, "if we can't learn why they went away, or
how, we may at least be able to discover where they went. Let us be
about it."

"Unfortunately," Ned replied, "we can't track them through the waters of
the channel. Water shows no footprints!"

"But they might not have gone away by water," insisted the other. "If
they had, they would have taken the motor boat."

"They did send a man to get it," Ned replied, "but he couldn't operate
it. That is why it was out of order this morning."

"How do you know that?"

"The man used matches there--the same kind of matches used in that
room."

"Some day," laughed Jimmie, "some guy will come here an' move the
bloomm' place away without bein' caught at it. Why didn't some one wake
up?"

"I didn't wake up," said the Captain, "but that is no proof that others
did not. You can't trust these Filipinos. The people of the pueblo might
have helped them away."

"Exactly!" said Ned.

"If they left in a canoe," Frank suggested, "we may be able to overtake
them."

"In this maze of islands!" cried the Captain. "I should say not."

"We'll get a ride anyway," Jimmie observed.

"If you'll tell Jack to get the _Manhattan_ ready," Ned said, "we'll
take a run out toward that rough-looking bit of land over there toward
the coast of China."

The boy darted away, and Ned directed the Captain's steps to the spot
where the canoe had been beached. After inspecting the thickets into
which the canoe had been drawn when taken from the water, the two, Ned
in the lead, pressed through the tangle which lined the bank until they
came to a clear space strewn with food tins which had the appearance of
having been opened within a few hours.

"They waited here," he said, "and ate while they waited. I found the key
here, and not at the point where the boat was pulled from the river. The
box to which it belongs was opened here and new papers put into it. At
least some papers which it had contained were removed. They were burned
one by one in that thicket ahead."

The Captain looked