er trip.
And they have a trip every ten days--say thirty trips a year to be on
the safe side--84,000 pounds a year profit! My eyes, Merriman, it would
be worth running some risks for 84,000 a year!"

"Risks?" cried Merriman, now as much excited as his friend. "They'd risk
hell for it! I bet, Hilliard, you've got it at last. 84,000 pounds a
year! But look here,"--his voice changed--"you have to divide it among
the members."

"That's true, you have," Hilliard admitted, "but even so--how many are
there? Beamish, Bulla, Coburn, Henri, the manager here, and the two men
they spoke of, Morton and Archer--that makes seven. That would give them
12,000 a year each. It's still jolly well worth while."

"Worth while? I should just say so." Merriman lay silently pondering the
idea. Presently he spoke again.

"Of course those figures of yours are only guesswork."

"They're only guesswork," Hilliard agreed with a trace of impatience in
his manner, "because we don't know the size of the tubes and the number
of the props, but it's not guesswork that they can make a fortune out of
smuggling in that way. We see now that the thing can be done, and how it
can be done. That's something gained anyway."

Merriman nodded and sat up in bed.

"Hand me my pipe and baccy out of that coat pocket like a good man," he
asked, continuing slowly:

"It'll be some job, I fancy, proving it. We shall have to see first if
the props are emptied at that depot, and if not we shall have to find
out where they're sent, and investigate. I seem to see a pretty long
program opening out. Have you any plans?"

"Not a plan," Hilliard declared cheerfully. "No time to make 'em yet.
But we shall find a way somehow."

They went on discussing the matter in more detail. At first the testing
of Hilliard's new theory appeared a simple matter, but the more they
thought it over the more difficult it seemed to become. For one thing
there would be the investigations at the depot. Whatever unloading of
the brandy was carried on there would probably be done inside the shed
and at night. It would therefore be necessary to find some hiding place
within the building from which the investigations could be made. This
alone was an undertaking bristling with difficulties. In the first
place, all the doors of the shed were locked and none of them opened
without noise. How were they without keys to open the doors in the dark,
silently and without leaving traces? Observations might