Dick Merriwell was almost frantic when the day of the race dawned without a sign of the return of Jim Phillips. He was convinced that some harm had befallen the baseball captain, and not for a hundred boat races would he have had that happen. He blamed himself bitterly for allowing Jim to undertake the reckless adventure of staying aboard the Marina to get further information as to the plans of the conspirators. Until dark on Wednesday night, he had not been much alarmed, for it had been long after midnight when he had last spoken to Jim. But when the whole day passed with no sign of Jim, Dick was frantic.
Bill Brady tried to reassure him, although he was himself far from easy in his mind.
“They wouldn’t dare do him any harm,” said Bill. “Those fellows know that as long as they just try these crooked gambling games, the worst that can happen to them is a year or two in jail. But murder, or hurting a man seriously, is another matter, and they’re not at all likely to take any such risks as that to put old Jim out of the way. I’m afraid they may have got onto him and tied him up to keep him from getting to us with whatever it is he’s learned. But, even if that’s so, they’ll turn him loose when the race is over, and he’ll be none the worse. As to your blaming yourself, that’s nonsense. It was Jim’s idea to stay in the water, and to stay on board, too, when he could have dropped into the launch.”
But Dick had spent a sleepless night, and the big catcher could do little to make the universal coach feel better, try as he would.
Finally, on Thursday morning, Dick, taking Brady in the launch with him, ran down to Red Top and told Neilson, the Harvard coach, the whole story.
Neilson looked very serious as he heard what the Yale coach knew and what he suspected.
“I’ll admit, of course,” he said, “that we thought the sudden slowing up of the crew mighty peculiar—and we didn’t know then that you’d had the same experience. Of course, there’s one thing settled. If there’s any skulduggery about the race to-day, and it’s discovered, we’ll be perfectly willing to call it no race and row it over, in case Yale lost through one of those mysterious experiences we’ve both had. What are you going to do about Phillips? I suppose that, as a Harvard man, I ought to be glad to hear he’s lost, but I’m going to do my level best to help you rescue him.”
Dick Merriwell gripped his rival’s hand hard.
“Thanks,” he said. “I knew you’d feel that way about it. I’m going down to that cursed Marina and see whether they mean to hold Jim. I think I’ve got evidence enough to justify me in getting official aid, and I know the captain of the revenue cutter Claremont. I think she’s in his jurisdiction, now.”
Neilson went along, and, an hour later, armed with a warrant of search from the United States court, and with a Federal marshal along, the Elihu Yale boarded the Marina.