ship’s company, some of them recruited under such strange circumstances, were on deck, with the exception, of course, of Mr. Jenkins and Dr. Sartorius. The latter had elected to remain below, but you may be sure that he was closely watched.
It was growing rapidly dusk. Nat noted with increasing uneasiness the slow gait of the Nomad and the still considerable distance to be covered by her before she reached her haven.
“I’ll tell you,” he said to Joe, who stood beside him, “we’ll put a wireless plant on the Nomad, and then in future if we get stuck we can at least flash word of our plight and get aid from some source or other.”
“That’s a good idea,” agreed Joe; “if only we had such a plant on board now we could send out a message for the gasolene boat that supplies the fishing fleet and be all right in a jiffy.”
But, fortunately for the boys, their troubles for the day at least appeared now to be over. The Nomad made her cove without further difficulty, although, as Joe remarked, “there was hardly another turn left in her.”
The party landed in the dinghy which had been towed safely by its stout hawser. Mr. Jenkins, thanks to the care of Dr. Chalmers, showed signs of rallying, and not long after he had been comfortably bestowed on a cot in the Motor Rangers’ hut he regained consciousness. Although the boys were burning to ask questions which would aid in elucidating the puzzling problem into which they had blundered, they were warned by Dr. Chalmers not to do so at the time.
“Let us give him time to collect his thoughts and not pester him by talking now,” he said. “Since I have heard your stories, I am just as curious as you are to find out the truth of the matter, and just where this Dr. Sartorius fits into the puzzle; for I am sure that he is a factor, and no beneficent one, in the case.”
A little later Dr. Chalmers decided that it would not be necessary to remove the injured man to the mainland that night. In fact, he was inclined to think that such a course might prove harmful. They all, therefore, determined to remain on the island all night. The boys were perfectly willing to adopt this course. They were all dog tired by the strenuous day which they had passed through, as were, indeed, all of the party. Dr. Sartorius sat sullenly in one corner of the shanty all the evening, only speaking in monosyllables, but the boys did not trouble themselves about him. After a hearty supper, all hands turned in and slept the sleep of the exhausted till morning.
The first thing when he awoke Nat looked around for their queer guest. He was not in the shanty, and, leaving the others still asleep, Nat set out on a tour of investigation. Somehow he deeply mistrusted and suspected this black-bearded stranger, and when he found him missing he at once surmised that all was not well. He bitterly regretted that they had not openly voiced their suspicions the night before, or at least kept a watch on the man. But it was too late now.
Full of apprehension, but of what he did not know, Nat hastened to the cove. The boat in which they had come ashore was gone, and, worse still, the Nomad was missing from her moorings!
“The scoundrel!” cried Nat indignantly. “This is some of his work, I’ll bet a dollar. Oh, what wouldn’t I give to get my hands on him! But what are we going to do now? Here we are practically marooned on this island. Thank goodness we have the wireless; otherwise we’d be in a bad fix. Nobody comes near this place but fishermen, and they don’t put in frequent appearances.”
As he hurried back to the hut, burning with indignation, Nat formed a theory concerning the disappearance of the small boat and the larger craft. It was plain that Sartorius wished to get ashore without landing with the party. Nat believed, in the light of recent events, that the man had a notion that the boys meant to communicate their suspicions to the authorities. But how he had succeeded in running the Nomad alone and single-handed was a mystery which was not solved till later.
When he burst into the hut, full of the story of the vanishing of the two boats, Nat found Dr. Chalmers bandaging Mr. Jenkins’ head and placing fresh dressings upon it. The bandages had been extemporized from a stock of clean linen the boys had along with them. The group within the hut was listening eagerly to something that the injured man was saying; but Nat’s news, which he blurted out as soon as he entered, quite drew away attention from their wounded guest, whose hurt, it transpired, was nothing more than a bad scalp wound.
“Boys, the boats have gone!” was the way Nat announced his news.
The others stared at him only half understandingly.
“Gone!” echoed Joe, the first to find his voice.
“Gug-gug-gone!” sputtered Ding-dong.
“Do you mean they have been stolen?” demanded Dr. Chalmers.
“That’s just what I do mean, sir.” And Nat proceeded to impart all that had occurred, not forgetting, of course, the disappearance of Dr. Sartorius.
“Well, this is a nice kettle of fish,” blurted out Joe angrily. “Oh, but weren’t we the chumps to take that fellow on board! I wish we’d left him to continue his way to Mexico, and let it go at that!”
“Too late now to cry over spilt milk,” declared Nat. He was going to say more when Mr. Jenkins, who had been listening to their talk, interrupted.
“Did I hear you mention the name of Sartorius?” he inquired in a feeble voice, although one that vibrated with a keen interest.
“Yes,” said Nat, and rapidly told how they came to include the name of the black-bearded man in their conversation.
“And he was here and is gone?” demanded Mr. Jenkins so excitedly that Dr. Chalmers had to beg him to calm himself.
The others stared at Mr. Jenkins. His hands clenched and unclenched.
“Oh, the precious scoundrel!” he choked out; and then added quickly, “Look in my coat and see if you can find some papers, a thick bundle held together with an india rubber band!”
Then, and not till then, did the Motor Rangers recall what the ship’s doctor had told them about a slashed coat. In the rush of events following the start of the return run, this fact had completely slipped their minds. A glance at the coat showed a slash over the breast pocket. Inside there were no such papers as the injured man described. The pocket was empty, in fact.
Mr. Jenkins groaned when he heard this.
“Oh, why didn’t I recover consciousness sooner?” he exclaimed, lying back weakly. “That rascal has taken the result of years of work and thought with him. I am ruined!”
Dr. Chalmers happened to have with him, in a sort of pocket emergency case, some soothing tablets. He crushed one of these in a tin cup of water and gave it to Mr. Jenkins. In a few seconds he spoke to him in a quiet tone:
“Suppose you tell us what you know about this man Sartorius, and how you came to be on the same ship, and also how you met with your accident – if it was an accident.”
“It was not an accident,” rejoined Mr. Jenkins emphatically, “the man Sartorius – who is not a doctor, but only styles himself such – came behind me on the companionway and shoved me so suddenly that I lost my balance and fell headlong. I turned in time to see him, but not to save myself. I had been on guard against attack, but not against such an attack as that. Then, having rendered me unconscious by the fall, he robbed me of the papers I have mentioned, for which he had tracked me across the continent.”
“Did you know that he was on board the Iroquois?” asked Nat, while the others formed an interested circle.
