“Now, then, where is Sangoa?  How can one get to the island?  And, finally, how did Jones get here from Sangoa and how is he to return, if he ever wants to go back to his valuable pearl fisheries, his people and his home?”

She strove earnestly to answer these questions, but could not with her present knowledge.  So she tucked the notebook into a drawer of her desk, put out her light and got into bed.

But sleep would not come to her.  The interest she took in the fate of young Jones was quite impersonal.  She liked the boy in the same way she had liked dozens of boys.  The fact that she had been of material assistance in saving his life aroused no especial tenderness in her.  On his own account, however, Jones was interesting to her because he was so unusual.  The complications that now beset him added to this interest because they were so curious and difficult to explain.  Maud had the feeling that she had encountered a puzzle to tax her best talents, and so she wanted to solve it.

Suddenly she bounded out of bed and turned on the electric light.  The notebook was again brought into requisition and she penciled on its pages the following words: 

“What was the exact date that Jack Andrews landed in America?  What was the exact date that Ajo landed from Sangoa?  The first question may be easily answered, for doubtless the police have the record.  But—­the other?”

Then she replaced the book, put out the light and went to sleep very easily.

That last thought, now jotted down in black and white, had effectually cleared her mind of its cobwebs.

CHAPTER XX

A GIRLISH NOTION

Colby came around next morning just as Mr. Merrick was entering the breakfast room, and the little man took the lawyer in to have a cup of coffee.  The young attorney still maintained his jaunty air, although red-eyed from his night’s vigil, and when he saw the Stanton girls and their Aunt Jane having breakfast by an open window he eagerly begged permission to join them, somewhat to Uncle John’s amusement.

“Well?” demanded Maud, reading Colby’s face with her clear eyes.

“I made a night of it, as I promised,” said he.  “This morning I know so much about pearls that I’m tempted to go into the business.”

“As Jack Andrews did?” inquired Flo.

“Not exactly,” he answered with a smile.  “But it’s an interesting subject—­so interesting that I only abandoned my reading when I found I was burning my electric lamp by daylight.  Listen:  A pearl is nothing more or less than nacre, a fluid secretion of a certain variety of oyster—­not the eatable kind.  A grain of sand gets between the folds of the oyster and its shell and irritates the beast.  In self-defense the oyster covers the sand with a fluid which hardens and forms a pearl.”

“I’ve always known that,” said Flo, with a toss of her head.