[CHAPTER XXIII—A SIGNAL FROM THE RADIO STATION]
No signs of life were apparent as the glare of the searchlight played over the great building, resembling a dock shed in appearance, which bulked on shore at the end of the pier and slightly to one side of it.
No other buildings could be seen, nothing but the steep slope of a summer-browned hill, as, obedient to instructions, Robbins swept the rays of the searchlight over the surroundings.
“Nothing but that great warehouse,” said Ensign Warwick to Jack.
“That building seems to me proof positive that this is headquarters for smugglers of Chinese coolies,” said Jack. “Probably ‘Black George’ housed them there before distributing them to the mainland. The boats from Mexico could run in here at night, discharge their coolies into that barracks, and nobody would be the wiser.”
An exclamation from Frank drew their attention.
“Look there.”
All gazed in the direction in which Frank pointed. On a shoulder of the hill behind the barracks, full in the glare of the searchlight, stood revealed a radio plant and antenna. Whoever aboard the Sub Chaser was operating the searchlight kept it fixed several minutes on this novel object.
“Not a sign of life there, either,” commented the naval officer. “If anybody is around here, he’s laying mighty low.”
They were close now to the barracks. Long, low, solid-walled with not a window in the sides but with traps in the roofs to admit light and air, it bulked before them—dark, mysterious, forbidding.