Doctor Hoff, who had been ramping with impatience over the man's
lack of definite memory, now rushed to the atlas and began to study
the maps.

"You needn't trouble," said Average Jones coolly. "You won't find
it there."

"I'll find that B. C. if I have to go over every map in the
geography."

"Then you'll have to get a Spanish edition. For a guess, B. C. is
Baja California, the Mexican peninsula of California."

Jones sent a supplementary wire to this effect to Cyrus C. Allen, of
the Cosmic Club, and within a few hours received a reply from that
eminent cartographer, who had been located in a remote part of
Connecticut:

"Probably Laguna Salada, not on map. Seventy miles long; four to
eight wide. Between Cocopah and Sierra Gigantica ranges. Country
very wild and arid. Can be reached by water from Yuma, or pack
train from Calexico. White, who has hunted there, says Captain
Funcke, Calexico, best guide.

"ALLEN."

Average Jones tossed this over to the father.

"As I figure it," he said, "your son's two friends had this all
mapped out beforehand for him. One went west direct. He was the