Conny Degger and his friend were fully dressed, even to their coats and hats. Two strapped valises stood at the foot of one of the beds. The attitude of the men showed that they were more than ordinarily startled by the entrance of the visitors. "Look out for that Burtwell, Tobias. He carries a pistol," called out Ralph, as he made for Degger. As Ralph slammed Degger against the wall, Burtwell made a motion toward his hip. There was a heavy water pitcher in the bowl on the washstand. As Tobias came through the doorway he saw this and grabbed it. "Ye would, would ye?" he shouted, and, catching the pitcher up and at full arm’s length, he broke the heavy piece of crockery over Burtwell’s head. The man crashed to the floor amid the shower of broken crockery, and the subsequent proceedings—even after the constable came to take both Degger and him to the local jail—interested Alonzo Burtwell not at all. Tobias and Ralph Endicott carried the two bags over to the bank, to which Mr. Arad Thompson had been wheeled in his chair to meet them at this early hour. When the bags were opened the money taken from the bank vault was found packed underneath the clothing of Degger and Burtwell. "That’s a relief, Tobias," the bank president said. "I’ve had the books examined, for I did not know but one of the employees might be crooked, too. This clears everything up." It was plain that Burtwell and Conny Degger had committed the burglary without other assistance. Later the Bankers’ Protective Association learned that Burtwell was known in the West as one of the most skillful bank burglars who ever "felt out" the combination of a vault doorlock. The writing of that combination in Ralph Endicott’s address book had merely been an attempt made by Conny Degger to throw suspicion on his enemy. "And o’ course," said the lightkeeper, as Ralph turned the prow of the limousine toward the Twin Rocks, steering carefully through the crowd of townsfolk that had gathered before the bank, "the rascal dropped your knife there where I found it. I cal’late he is a reg’lar snake in the grass, that Degger. And to think of his trying to shine up to our Lorny. Oh, sugar!" Ralph flashed the old man a sharp glance. "What do you think, Tobias? Do you suppose Lorna really cared for the fellow?" "Humph!" was the lightkeeper’s non-committal reply. "For I tell you what it is," the young man went on with earnestness. "I’ve been thinking a good deal about it lately——" "Humph!" said Tobias again. "About it, or about her?" "Why, confound you, Tobias Bassett, of course I mean I’ve been thinking of Lorna. And I think a whole lot of her. But she doesn’t care enough about me——" "Oh, sugar!" drawled Tobias. "I should say not. Risked her life and all. _Would_ go with me in that motor-boat to get them life savers. Ran all the way to Upper Trillion when my old pumps plumb give out. No, no! Of course she don’t think nothing at all about you, Ralph." "Well——"