on't you forget it!" he declared.

"Well, we don't have to quarrel about it," snapped Tom, rather disgusted
with the way Ralph was behaving. "Come on! we might as well go back. But
here's one blow for liberty!" and he laughed and flung the spade forward
with all his strength.

Jerry Sheming had never suspected it, or he would not have left the
excavation just as he had. There was but a thin shell beyond where he had
been digging, and the spade in Tom's hand went clear through.

"For the goodness gracious grannies!" gasped Tom, scrambling off his
knees. "I--I came near losing that spade altogether."

There was a fall of earth beyond the hole. They heard it rolling and
tumbling down a sharp descent.

"Hold the lantern here, Ruth!" cried Tom, trying to peer into the opening.

Ruth did so. The rays revealed a hole, big enough for a man to creep
through. It gave entrance, it seemed, to another cavern--and one of good
size.

"Oh, my dear!" exclaimed Ruth, seizing Tom's arm. "I just know what this
means."

"You may. _I_ don't," laughed Tom Cameron.

"Why, this other cavern is the one that was buried under the landslide.
Jerry said he knew about where it was, and he's been trying to dig into
it."

"Oh, yes; there was a landslide on this side of the cliff just about the
time father was negotiating for the purchase of the island last summer,"
said Ralph. "We all came up here to look at the place a while afterward.
We camped in a tent about where the lodge now stands. That old crazy
hunter had just been taken away from here. They say he tried to kill
Blent."

"And maybe he had good reason," said Tom. "Blent is without a doubt a
pretty mean proposition."

"Just the same, the island is my father's," declared Ralph, with
confidence. "He bought it, right enough."

"All right. But you think, Ruth, that perhaps it was in this buried cave
that old Mr. Tilton hid his money box?"

"So Jerry said. It looks as though Jerry had been digging here----"

"Let's have another crack at it!" c