“It wasn’t the car we wanted, it was someone on it,” answered Frank. “Fifteen minutes will give him such a start that we can’t follow him.”
“Was he a pickpocket?” asked the fisherman.
“We don’t know what he was,” said Andy. “Come on, Frank, we’ll go back and talk to Jim Hedson.”
“I was thinking of taking the next car, and keeping after this fellow,” spoke Frank, with his usual determined manner.
“What would be the use?” asked Andy, who generally took the easiest way. “He might get off anywhere along the line, and we could hunt all day and not find him. It would be time wasted.”
“I guess you’re right,” assented Frank, with a sigh. “But I hate to give up. I’m sure there’s some great mystery back of all this, and Paul and that man are in some manner connected with it. I shouldn’t be surprised if that man had wronged Paul in some way.”
“How, by taking his motor boat?”
“No, in some other way. It was a queer thing why Paul should be out in his boat alone in the blow. Then to have the boat disappear, and to be seen again towed by this man.”
“You’re not sure of the last part.”
“I am pretty sure. But let’s ask Mr. Hedson what he knows about it.”