suit him," smiled Noll.

"I can't imagine what it is," replied Hal, undisturbed. "It couldn't be
anything in the high treason line, anyway."

"Why not even that?" demanded Sergeant Noll.

"Why, look here, old fellow, we're just two plain, kid, doughboy
sergeants of the line. If that fellow had wanted anything in the
treasonable variety, what sort of goods could we deliver him, anyway?
Nothing, much, beyond our own arms and a copy of the company's roll."

"Then what on earth was the fellow up to, anyway?"

"I don't know, Noll, and I don't much care. I've heard that there are
sharks of all sorts here in Manila, ready to put up all sorts of games
to get the easy-mark soldier's pay away from him. Probably Tomba and his
friend belong in that class."

"Pooh! Tomba has plenty of money," snorted Noll Terry. "He wouldn't have
to be out for a poor, buck-foot soldier's pay."

"Swindlers sometimes do have plenty of money, for a while, until the law
rounds them up and puts them where they ought to be," observed Sergeant
Hal sagely. "Let's forget the fellow, Noll, unless we see him again.
Tomba is evidently up to something crooked, and we're not, so we haven't
any real interest in him, have we?"

"Except to be on our guard," said Noll.

"You speak as though you had some forebodings regarding Tomba, or Tomba
and his friend," smiled Hal quizzically.

"Well, then, I have," returned Noll Terry.

"Not scared, are you?"

"That's a fine question to ask a soldier," sniffed Noll.

"Well, I'm not going to waste any more thoughts on Tomba, or on his
white-man companion, either. Whee! Look at that rain. It----"

But a fearfully vivid flash of tropical lightning caused Sergeant Hal
Overton to step further back into the little shed and close his eyes for
an instant. Right after the flash came a prolonged, heavy roll of
thunder that made the earth shake.

"_Cochero, para!_" shouted Noll right after that, and a fareless
_quilez_ stopped near the door of the shed.

"_Occupado_ (occupied)?" called Noll.

"No, senor."

Hal and Noll bolted through the rain, darted into the _quilez_ through
the door at the rear, and plumped themselves down on the seats.

"_Sigue directio, Malate, cuartel nipa,_" ordered Hal, thus instructing
the driver to go straight ahead to Malate and to take them to the nipa
barracks.

The Filipino driver himself was drenched. In his thin cotton clothing
the little brown man perched on the box outside, shiver