rst out.

"Are you sure this is the place?" asked Mr. Wilton, turning to the boys.

"Positive," answered Joe.

"Here's the pile of rocks on which the lantern was set," added Blake.

"But there's no lantern here now," said Tom Cardiff.

"Then they've skipped!" declared the life saver. "They got suspicious
and left, taking the lantern with 'em!"

CHAPTER XIX

ON THE TRAIL

There was no doubt about it, the wreckers were not there, and the
indications were that they had betaken themselves to some other
location.

When the men flashed the pocket electric lamps they had brought with
them, the little opening at the top of the cliff was well illuminated.

"Nothing doing!" exclaimed Joe, regretfully.

"They must have skipped out right after they chased us," decided Blake.

"And they went in a hurry, too," declared Tom Cardiff.

"What makes you think so?" asked one of the government officers.

"Look at how this stone pile, which they intended to use as a base for
their lantern, is disturbed, and pulled apart," went on the assistant
lighthouse keeper, as he flashed his torch on it. "I'll wager, boys,
that when you saw it, with that contrivance atop by which they hoped to
fool some vessels, this stone pile was well built up; wasn't it?"

"Yes," said Blake, "it was."

"Because," went on Tom Cardiff, "it would have to be so to make their
light steady, to give the impression that it was one of the regular
government lights. They were going to work a shutter, you boys say, to
give the impression of a revolving light, and that would make it
necessary to have a firm foundation.

"And yet now the whole top of this stone pile is torn apart, showing
that they must have ripped out whatever they had here to hold the
lantern. They got away in a hurry, is my opinion."

"And I guess we'll all have to agree," put in the life saver. "The
question is--where did they go?"

"And that's a question we've got to answer," added Tom Cardiff. "We've
got to get on the trail."

"Why so?" asked the life saver. "If you've driven 'em off, so they can't
try any of their dastardly tricks to lure vessels ashore, isn't that all
you want? You've spoiled their game."

"Yes!" cried Tom Cardiff, "we've spoiled it for this one place, but
they'll be at it somewhere else."

"What do you mean?" asked Joe.

"I mean that they've gone somewhere else!" exclaimed the assistant
keeper. "They've made tracks away from here, but they've gone to