effort to open it,
but with no success.

"No use," he whispered to his kneeling mate, "it's got the bar down in
place. Listen and see if you can catch a sound from inside."

A minute passed with both straining their hearing to the utmost--Perk
even laid his head against the closed door so as to better catch any
suspicious sound from within.

"Huh! guess they ain't nothin' doin', partner," he hissed in a
disappointed tone, "thought I did get a little ruslin' sound, like paper
bein' crumpled up when you're a'makin' a fire, but don't hear it no
longer."

"Paper, you say?" snapped Jack uneasily, "I don't like that any too
much."

"Why not?" asked the other, evidently at a loss to understand why such a
simple little thing like that could annoy any one--what if the man at
bay figured on setting fire to the hidden little retreat he had arranged
here close to the lonely lake where he could slip away whenever he felt
like shunning those society people over at crowded Miami--he surely had
no intention of cremating himself and they could nab him if he started
to make off.

"Paper--don't you know what he was doing when we peeped in--that book
ought to be worth its weight in gold to us as evidence and that stack of
papers that he was looking through--if he's given enough time he may put
a match to the bunch and destroy everything that could be used against
him. We've got to keep him from doing that, brother."

"Yeah--but how?" gasped the other, showing renewed signs of excitement
as he visioned the holocaust with their fine plans going up in fire and
smoke just when they seemed about to corral success.

Jack answered that question by striking the door with his foot, the
result being a loud thump. Then he caught hold of his chum and dragged
him to one side. None too soon was this done, for there came a series of
staccato explosions from inside the shack and tiny gleams of light in
various sections of the door told that bullets had passed through the
wood in a number of places. Only for this prompt action on the part of
the cautious one, either or both might have had leaden pellets lodged
promiscuously about their persons with resultant painful sensations.

"Wow! that was what I'd call a close shave," whispered the kneeling Perk
as he surveyed those suspicious holes in the badly riddled door, all on
a line with any crouching human figure without.

There could no longer be any doubt as to the warlike intentions of the
man