“Look here now. Let’s face this thing right. There seems to be no doubt that your relatives were here, Bob. They aren’t here now; but just stop and think.
“That old sailor on the Hassen saw them the other night, and they were all right then. And since he saw them there has been no storm. The sea has been calm, this boat has not been harmed, so the only natural conclusion is that Mr. Sheldon and his daughter have been taken off, Bob.”
“Maybe,” admitted the stout boy, after considering the matter. “But who did it? Where are they?”
“That’s something we can’t tell,” admitted Jerry frankly. “But I’m positive they are safe.”
“So am I!” exclaimed Ned decidedly.
“And I’m going to hope so,” came from Bob.
There seemed to be now no further use in the boys remaining in the lifeboat. They had found out what they wanted to learn, unsatisfactory as the information was. Bob put in his pocket the handkerchief of his cousin—the handkerchief that had done so much to solve the mystery.
“She must have dropped it when—when she was getting in the other boat to go aboard the vessel that took them off,” he said.
“Of course,” agreed Jerry. “Well, we may as well get back on the Comet.”
“Too bad to let this fine boat go adrift, but there’s no help for it,” murmured Ned.