d then the turtle got busy and got
Shout by the hand. Then there was more fun!"

"What did they do with the turtle at last?" questioned Jack.

"Oh, Shout wouldn't take any chances," answered Andy. "He put the
turtle down on the floor and smashed it with his heel; and then, of
course, the fun was all over."

"Did they find out how the turtle came to be there?" questioned Fred.

"No, they didn't. Codfish came along, and he started to say something,
but I put up my fist and motioned to him, and then he shut up like a
clam."

"He'll give you away sooner or later, Andy," remarked Jack.

"If he does, he'll pay for it," retorted the fun-loving Rover.

Several days went by, and during that time the boys learned not a
little concerning the catastrophe at the Hasley Shell-Loading plant,
the local papers giving a full account of the affair. Fortunately the
report that several had been killed was untrue, but about sixteen men
had been injured, and several of them quite seriously.

There were many speculations concerning what had started the
explosions. It was proved that the first had occurred in one of the
cars which was standing loaded on the railroad track, while the second
explosion had come less than a minute later from what was known as
Storehouse No. 3. Then had followed an explosion at Storehouse No. 2,
and after that the explosions had come so rapidly and there had been
so much excitement that no one could tell exactly what had happened
next. But fortunately the explosions had been confined to the
storehouses and the loaded cars on the track. The main building of the
shell-loading plant had suffered considerably, but a portion was still
standing, and some underground vaults, filled with high explosives,
had not been reached. Had these explosives gone up, it is more than
likely Haven Point, as well as Clearwater Hall and possibly Colby
Hall, would have been shaken to their foundations and with great loss
of life.

A rigid investigation had been started by three different parties--the
owners of the plant, the local authorities, and the Secret Service of
the national government. The Secret Service men, of course, made no
public report, but the others in authority came to the conclusion that
the explosions had been started either by some spies working for the
shell-loading plant or by two suspicious-looking men who had been seen
several times around the place--the same fellows described by Jed
Kessler.

"Maybe tho