"I reckon we are on the right track for sure," said Henry, struggling into his O.D. shirt. "That fellow Joe Choiniski is one of the tough nuts who joined us from San Juan in the last draft right after we came here. He’s been on some ’spit-kit’[#] stationed down in these waters for a long time and speaks the native lingo. The man with him is a bad egg too, though he has never been caught so far." [#] "Spit-kit"--Really "spit-kid," a small wooden cask set about the deck for spit-boxes. Spitting upon decks is an unpardonable sin. The name is slangily applied to the smaller vessels of the Navy. "What is his name?" asked Richard, preparing to open the door. "Never did hear his right name; the men on board call him ’Slugger.’" "I know now," said Dick, "they say he used to be a prize-fighter and he’s all the time bragging how he can mix it up with the gloves, but no one ever saw him put them on since he came on board. He’s husky enough, but all out of training." "That’s the fellow,--a tough customer, I reckon." The boys, finding the coast clear, emerged from the hut and were soon following the trail which the two men and horseman before them had presumably travelled. For a while the way led through a veritable tangle of briers, weeds, bamboo and underbrush, but after a quarter of a mile with no break on either side the path joined into a wider and well worn trail through a piece of timberland leading almost due north and south. In the shade of the tall hardwood trees the ground was softer and the spoor of the horse was distinctly shown turning to the right. This fortunate discovery saved the boys any possibility of going wrong. The island at this point was sparsely settled, as in 1906 the Navy Department had required all squatters to move off the government reservations. The trail was now nearing the boundaries of the northern tract. For another quarter of a mile they went on, each moment hoping to discover some evidence to substantiate their deductions, but the silence of the wilderness was about them, only broken occasionally by the cooing of the blue doves high up in the tree-tops. Here and there the woods gave place to clearings covered with waving grass or untended banana patches, affording long vistas of land and water but not a house nor animal nor human being rewarded their sharp searching. To their left was South West Cay, separated from the larger island they were on by a narrow dangerous channel. To their right they caught occasional glimpses of Flamingo Bay or the distant top of Mount Resaca. During one of their halts before emerging into plain view on the hog-back trail, Henry caught Dick by the shoulder and pulled him down in the shelter of the long grass which carpeted a steep slope on their left, down to the very edge of the water. "Look, there is your horseman!" he whispered excitedly, forgetting his voice would not reach half the distance to the object at which he was pointing.