"This leaves me stranded," the Major said. "I am ordered to act only after acquiring later information concerning the situation, the same to be delivered by Lieutenant Rowe. In the absence of that information, what am I to do? My present orders may be all wrong."
"Perhaps," Ned suggested, "it may be well to visit this hut and see what we can discover there. The Lieutenant may have gone out for a morning's hunt."
"No such good luck as that," replied the Captain. "Why, the little furniture the hut contains is broken to bits, and the floor is streaked with blood! There was a fight in there last night, depend upon it!"
"And no one heard anything unusual during the night?" asked Ned.
"Not that I know of."
"Are the usual residents of this place, so far as you know, all here this morning?" was the next question.
"I will ascertain that," said the Captain. "I learned of the strange happening only a few minutes before your arrival."
The three left the house, the only one of size there, and proceeded down a mushy street between huts and thickets until they came to a little nipa hut set high on poles. They climbed the bamboo stairs and stood on the swaying porch in front, seeing no one about the place.
The door stood wide open, and Captain Godwin was first to enter. There was only one room in the hut, but there were two alcoves opening from it—narrow little alcoves in which, evidently, bedding and articles not wanted for immediate use were tucked away during the day.
As the Captain had stated, the apartment was in disorder. The mosquito wiring had been torn from the three windows and the door and now lay in a tangle on the floor. Bamboo chairs had been broken, and there was a faint odor of whisky in the room. Major Ross glanced casually over the interior and turned away.