t to have done; and it looks very much
as if he calls everything by its right name, something which I should
think no person anxious to keep such a secret would do. If he means
'bank,' he might as well have called it by another name altogether."

"I think ordinarily he would have been safe in writing his cipher as he
has done; but, be that as it may, I am confident you have made a most
important discovery."

CHAPTER X

FARMER JONES

The conclusion which I formed respecting the cipher telegram, so cleverly
translated by Ben Mayberry, was that it concerned an intended robbery of
one of the banks in Damietta, and that the crime, for the reason hinted
in the dispatch, was postponed until the succeeding autumn.

Under such circumstances it will be seen that it was my duty to
communicate with the general manager of the company, which I proceeded to
do without delay. In reply, he instructed me to place myself in
communication with the mayor of the city, whose province it was to make
provision against what certainly looked like a contemplated crime.

This instruction was carried out, and the mayor promptly took every means
at his command to checkmate any movement of the suspected party. He
arranged to shadow him by one of the best detectives in the country,
while I agreed to notify him of the contents of any more suspicious
telegrams passing over the wires.

It need hardly be said that the friends of Ben Mayberry and myself took
care that his exploit on the memorable winter night should not pass by
unnoticed. The single daily paper published in Damietta gave a thrilling
account of the carrying away of the bridge, and the terrible struggle of
the boy in the raging river--an account which was so magnified that we
laughed, and Ben was angry and disgusted. One of the best traits of the
boy was his modesty, and it was manifest to everyone that this continued
laudation was distasteful to him in the highest degree.

The cap-sheaf came when one of the metropolitan weeklies published an
illustration of the scene, in which Ben was pictured as saving not only
the mother and daughter, but the horse as well, by drawing them by main
force upon an enormous block of ice! There was not the slightest
resemblance to the actual occurrence, and the picture of our young hero
looked as much like me as it did like Ben, who would have cried with
vexation had not the whole thing been such a caricature that he was
compelled to laugh inst