“Not with what this craft draws,” replied the sailor. “You haven’t got over three feet, and the rocks are a fathom below the surface at low tide.”
Sam prepared his shark lines. He had two of them, each one with six feet of chain nearest the hook, for the big fish would bite through the hempen strands in an instant. The hooks were of good size, and Sam baited each one with a bit of the fat salt pork. Then he fastened the lines to the stern of the boat, and taking up his position where he could feel to see if there was a bite, he tossed the bait overboard.
“Send her slow and easy,” he said to Ned, who was at the wheel. “We’ll soon be on their feeding ground.”
With the motor running on first speed the boat, which had been put some distance out from shore, went down along the coast. It was a calm day, and so clear that objects could be seen for a long distance.
“Well,” remarked Jerry in a low voice to his two chums, who were in the bow, “we didn’t land him that time.”
“Got to try the next lighthouse,” said Bob. “What are we going to do when we find Bill?”
That was a phase of the question that had not occurred to any of them up to this point.
“Make him give up the ring,” suggested Ned.
“We’d better go slow, where Bill Berry is concerned,” Bob said. “I think it would be better to tell the professor what we know.”
“Let’s find Bill first,” counseled Jerry. “Be careful not to let any one know we’re looking for him.”