For a while Chahda had attended school in America, then he had gone to the Pacific with the Spindrift expedition to Kwangara Island. After salvaging the remains of an ancient temple from one hundred fathoms of water--not to mention the treasure that was found--the Spindrifters had returned home. But Chahda had elected to remain in Hawaii with Professor Warren of the Pacific Ethnographic Society. Later, he had gone with the Warren scientific expedition to the South Seas, and Barby, Rick, and Scotty had joined the party in New Caledonia. After completing part of the expedition's work, the trawler _Tarpon_ had returned to New Caledonia where the young people had solved the mystery of _The Phantom Shark_. When the three Spindrifters returned home, Chahda had taken air passage to Bombay to see his family. "I can't remember all we talked about," Rick muttered to himself. "We talked about everything and anything. Except codes. I can't remember that we ever talked about codes." He got up, noticing that the crew of builders were in their barge, returning to the mainland for the night. They were trucking materials to a point on the shore near Spindrift, using an old wood road, then taking the stuff the rest of the way by barge. It was getting on to dinnertime. He took the woods path back, passing by the new cottages. They were nearing completion, the outsides already finished. Beyond the cottages was the farm run by the Huggins family. Mr. Huggins was just herding the island's milk cows into the barn for milking. Rick kicked at a near-by tree. "Either I'm dumb or it isn't as simple as we think it ought to be," he said aloud, then went on into the house. * * * * * Scotty and Barby had done no better. They gathered at the family table with long faces and Barby placed the disturbing cable in the middle of the table as a centerpiece. "If we look at it long enough, maybe we'll get inspiration," she said. Professor Julius Weiss, the only one of the three staff scientists who was at home at the moment, picked up the cable and examined it. "A cipher, eh?" He adjusted his glasses. "It certainly looks complicated." "Any ideas?" Rick asked hopefully. The little mathematician shook his head. "No, Rick. I could give you the cube root of the square of the sum of the numbers, or anything like that, but I'm afraid I wouldn't even know how to start breaking the code." He added, "John probably could. He had some experience with codes while in the Navy, I believe." John was Professor John Gordon. He was on an extended trip to New Mexico, serving as a consultant to the Navy's guided missiles projects. The third scientist, Professor Hobart Zircon, was giving a five-week series of lectures in nuclear physics at Yale. "I'm afraid Professor Gordon is too far away to help us on this," Rick said. Mrs. Brant came in, bringing a heavily laden dish of fresh corn on the cob. Behind her trotted a shaggy little dog.