Involuntarily Mark turned. He saw nothing alarming. The next instant he
felt himself grasped in the strong arms of the man, and a cloth that
smelled strongly of the strange, sweetly sickish odor was pressed over
the lad's face.

"Here! Stop! Let me go! Help! Help!" cried Mark. Then his voice died
out. He felt weak and sick, and sank back, an inert mass in the man's
arms.

"I guess I've got you this time," whispered the fellow, as he gazed
down on Mark's white face. "I'll put you where you won't get away,
either," and, picking up the youth, he carried him a prisoner into the
deserted house.




CHAPTER VIII

JACK IS PUZZLED


Whistling merrily, with his mind as much on the big field of diamonds
he expected to discover on the moon, as it was on anything else, Jack
Darrow crossed over the meadows toward the telegraph office.

"By Jinks! It certainly will be great to fly through space once more,"
he mused. "Of course it isn't much of a trip, only a quarter of a
million miles at most, but it will be a little outing for us, and then
those diamonds!"