By skillful manipulation of the two propellers he kept his promise and by three o’clock they had the little tents up and, as Gordon said, “were all fixed for light housekeeping.” CHAPTER V SEARCHING “Now I think we’d better go into a committee of the whole and take a look at that map again,” Rogers told them when they were finished. “We’re a committee in a hole all right,” Gordon laughed. “But it isn’t a very deep one just at present,” Bill added. By this time Rogers had the old map spread out on a flat rock and the two boys looked over his shoulders as he proceeded to explain it more thoroughly to them. “Now, as near as I can estimate it, we’re right here,” he began placing the point of his pencil on the map. “And right off here it looks to me as though he had tried to represent a cliff or a hill only a short distance from the shore. Unfortunately there’s no scale to the map so we can’t tell how far from here it is, but right here’s where he hid the stuff and it’s evidently in a cave in the side of the cliff.” “And it’s up to us to find the cliff,” Gordon suggested. “Exactly, and it ought not to be a very difficult task,” Rogers told them. “The island isn’t large and it’s somewhere on this end of it, that’s certain.” “Was, you mean, don’t you?” Bill asked. “What do you mean, was? Caves don’t run around you know.” “No, but you want to remember that they have earthquakes out here and that cave may have vanished a long time ago. That’s what I’m most afraid of,” Bill explained. “Of course that’s a chance we’ve got to take. If it’s gone we’re out of luck, that’s all.” “So far as finding the platinum is concerned you mean?” Gordon asked. “Certainly that’s what I mean. We’re having the trip in any case.” “Well, are we going to start to-day or wait till to-morrow?” Bill asked. “I guess it’s too late to do much to-day,” Rogers said, “but we might take a walk down to the shore and see what it looks like.” “Wait a minute till we hide those cells,” Bill suggested. “We’ve got to put them where no one will find them and I don’t mean maybe.” A good hiding place was soon located behind one of the rocks which formed the rim of their bowl, as Gordon called it, and they were soon on their way to the shore only a short distance away. “There are your cliffs all right,” Gordon said as they stood on the sand close to the water’s edge and looked at the rocky formation. They had reached the shore by means of a defile which led between two jutting masses of rock and was hardly wide enough to allow them to pass in single file. “It’s low tide now,” Rogers declared. “And at high tide the water must reach to the foot of the cliff,” Bill added. “We’ll have to watch our step and not get caught by the tide.” “Yep, that wouldn’t be so good,” Gordon agreed.