announcing in a voice of
triumph:

"This paper is the kind they use for printing money on!"

We stared at him, but he volunteered nothing further, having again bent
over his search. For several minutes we watched in silence. Then he sat
up with a snap, as a steel spring might be released.

"The man who made this bomb made my counterfeit bank note," he cried.

Tommy and I jumped.

"Just so," he continued eagerly. "The bomb is a hurried affair,
impromptu, constructed of materials happening to be at hand when needed.
That necessity, we assume, arose within the last few hours, since we
have been in these waters but shortly. Here is a piece of the wrapper.
You make nothing of it, yet to my experienced knowledge I see the
identical paper on which my money is printed. The counterfeiter,
possessing a good resisting paper and suddenly desiring to make a bomb,
employs it. So much for so much! Now we have him a bomb-maker and a
counterfeiter;--then we shall eliminate the anarchist!"

"Why?" I asked.

"Because a counterfeiter of such skill--and this engraving is the work
of a master--implies long and intense application; therefore a secluded
life rather than one of following the red flag. Moreover, an anarchist
would be tempted into this risk, such as tried upon us, only to destroy
someone of great importance--which I may conclude no one of us is. And
irrespective of these reasons counterfeiters do not sympathize with
anarchy. The psychology of each must be diametric, for if there is no
government to make money there is no money to counterfeit. So the
anarchist in our case lacks motive, but the other finds it if he
suspects us of knowing his secret. So much for so much. Do we know any
counterfeiter's secret? No. Then a final theory: the placer of this bomb
has mistaken us for an enemy--he thinks we are whom we are not!"

"That's what I said," Gates interposed.

"But he does suspect us of knowing it," Tommy exclaimed, "or why did he
tell the waiter Jack was a detective?"

The professor, obviously disappointed, turned again to the bomb that was
fast reaching a state of _deshabille_--if bombs can be said to reach
that state.

"You assume this to be the work of people on that yacht," he said, with
a touch of annoyance. "Can you sustain that theory?"

"Why, of course, sir," Gates declared.

"A mere presumption, _mon Capitaine!_"

"But the voice," I challenged. "Don't you suppose I recognized it?"

"Tut-tut, my boy Ja