“I don’t believe the telegraph there is work-ing,” laughed Professor Bumper.  “But suit yourself.  I must go back to New York to arrange for the goods we’ll have to take with us.  In a week, Tom, we’ll start.”

“You must stay to dinner,” Tom said.  “You can’t get a train now anyhow, and father wants to meet you again.  He’s pretty well, considering his age.  And he’s much better I verily believe since I said I’d turn over to him the task of finishing the stabilizer.  He likes to work.”

“We’ll stay and take the night train back,” agreed Mr. Damon.  “It will be like old times, Tom,” he went on, “traveling off together into the wilds.  Central America is pretty wild, isn’t it?” he asked, as if in fear of being disappointed! on that score.

“Oh, it’s wild enough to suit any one,” answered Professor Bumper.

“Well, now to settle a few details,” observed Tom.  “Ned, what is the situation as regards the financial affairs of my father and myself?  Nothing will come to grief if we go away, will there?”

“I guess not, Tom.  But are you going to take your father with you?”

“No, of course not.”

“But you spoke of `we.’ "

“I meant you and I are going.”

“Me, Tom?”

“Sure, you!  I wouldn’t think of leaving you behind.  You want Ned along, don’t you, Professor?”

“Of course.  It will be an ideal party—­we four.  We’ll have to take natives when we get to Honduras, and make up a mule pack-train for the interior.  I had some thoughts of asking you to take an airship along, but it might frighten the Indians, and I shall have to depend on them for guides, as well as for porters.  So it will be an old-fashioned expedition, in a way.”

Mr. Swift came in at this point to meet his old friends.

“The boy needs a little excitement,” he said.  “He’s been puttering over that stabilizer invention too long.  I can finish the model for him in a very short time.”

Professor Bumper told Mr. Swift something about the proposed trip, while Mr. Damon went out with Tom and Ned to one of the shops to look at a new model aeroplane the young inventor had designed.

There was a merry party around the table at dinner, though now and then Ned noticed that Tom had an abstracted and preoccupied air.

“Thinking about the idol of gold?” asked Ned in a whisper to his chum, when they were about to leave the table.

“The idol of gold?  Oh, yes!  Of course!  It will be great if we can bring that back with us.”  But the manner in which he said this made Ned feel sure that Tom had had other thoughts, and that he had used a little subterfuge in his answer.

Ned was right, as he proved for himself a little later, when, Mr. Damon and the professor having gone home, the young financial secretary took his friend to a quiet corner and asked: 

“What’s the matter, Tom?”