Those hours of preparation passed more quickly to Frank than any that he could recall during his busy young life, and over and over again he despaired of the party being ready in time, so that he could hardly believe it when the carriage-door was slammed, the whistle sounded, and the train glided out of the London terminus with the question being mentally asked, Shall we ever see the old place again? Then sleepless nights and drowsy days, as the party sped through France and Switzerland, dived through the great tunnel, to flash out into light in sunny Italy, and then on and on south, with the rattle of the train forming itself into a constant repetition of two words, which had been yelled in the tunnel and echoed from the rocky walls of the deep cutting--always the same: "_Save Harry! Save Harry_!" till Frank's brain throbbed. Then Brindisi, with the mails being hurried from the train to the noble steamer waiting to plough the Mediterranean and bear the adventurers south and east for the land of mystery with its wonders of a bygone civilisation buried deeply in the ever-preserving sand. And now for the first time Frank's brain began to be at rest from the hurry of the start, as he lay back half asleep in the hot sunshine, watching the surface of the blue Mediterranean and the soft, silvery clouds overhead, while the doctor and the professor sat in deck-chairs, reading or comparing notes, but all three resting so as to be ready for the work in hand. It was one glorious evening when Frank was leaning over the side gazing forward towards the land that they were soon to reach, and where they would give up the inert life they were leading for one of wild and stirring adventure, that the young man suddenly started out of his dreamy musings, for a voice behind him said softly-- "Beg pardon, sir." Frank turned sharply round. "Don't mind me speaking, sir, I hope?" "No, Sam," said Frank, rousing himself and speaking in a tone which plainly suggested, "_Go on_." "Thankye, sir. Don't seem to have had a chance to speak to you in all this rumble tumble sort of look-sharp-or-you'll-be-left-behind time." "No, we haven't seen much of one another, Sam." "We ain't, sir, and I don't know as I've wanted to talk much, for it's took all my time to think and make out whether it's all true." "All true?" "Yes, sir. Seems to me as if I'm going to wake up directly to find I've been having a nap in my pantry in Wimpole Street." "Hah! It has been a rush, Sam." "Rush, sir? It's wonderful. Seems only yesterday we were packing up, and now here we are--down here on the map. One of the sailors put his finger--here it is, sir, signed Jack Tar, his mark, for it was one of the English sailors, not one of the Lascar chaps. That's where we are, sir." Sam held up a conveniently folded map, surely enough marked by the tip of a perspiring finger.