swered the boy.

Ned tried to stop him, but the little fellow dodged away and disappeared
around an angle of the house.

The boys waited in suspense for a moment, expecting every instant to
witness the explosion, then Frank and Jack darted around the corner, in
quest of Jimmie.

"Come back!" Ned called, but they paid no heed.

Both Ned and the Captain sprang after the lads, the latter expressing in
very vigorous language his opinion of boys who would take such risks out
of curiosity.

"I'd rather wait an hour for an explosion than go up to see why it
didn't come off in time," he said. "That Jimmie needs a good beating.
He'll get it, too, if he doesn't behave!"

Ned laughed, serious as the situation was, at the thought of what would
be apt to happen if the Captain should lay hands on the little fellow in
anger. He would have the other boys on his hands in a second!

When Ned rounded the corner he saw Jimmie's heels half blocking a cellar
window. Thick smoke was oozing out around him, and Frank and Jack were
trying to pull him back.

"You let go!" they heard the little fellow shout. "I guess I know what
I'm doin'. You let go!"

"Wait!" Ned said, then he stooped over and called out to Jimmie:

"Is the fuse out?"

"Sure!" was the reply. "'Sure the fuse is out, but before it went out
it set fire to something on the cellar bottom, an' the blaze is workin'
its way up to the powder, or whatever it is. Ouch!" he added, as Jack
gave a pull at his foot. "You let go!"

"Let him go," Ned advised. "Perhaps he can get in there in time to
prevent the explosion."

"The little gink!" Jack exclaimed, "I wanted to see the thing bust up.
Now he's spoiled it!"

In a moment the boy was in the cellar, and Ned was not far away when the
creeping flame was extinguished. While Frank and Jack looked in at the
window, shielding their eyes and faces from the smudge as well as it was
possible to do, Ned called out to them:

"Tell Captain Martin to keep his men on guard around the house. The
scamps who did this may be up to some other trick. They're determined
that we shall never get to Peking!"

Frank crawled through the window and stood by Ned's side, searchlight in
hand. Just about underneath the center of the house, was a half barrel
of gunpowder.

"That would have done the business," Frank observed, and Jimmie made a
wry face. "If this little nuisance hadn't seen the fuse burning, we
might have been killed."