"Alive! All of you!" cried Fred. "Oh, this is the best news yet!"
"And we are glad to see you alive too," cried Tom. "We were afraid the Mascotte had been lost."
"Well, we came close to it," said Songbird. "And when we got in to port some of the passengers had the captain arrested for ill treatment. But we didn't wait for that. We were wild to know what had become of you, and so we chartered this tug and began a hunt. You were lucky to be picked up by such a nice craft as this."
"We weren't picked up,—we picked ourselves up," answered Dick.
"Why, what do you mean?" asked Harold Bird, in puzzled tones.
"We found this steam yacht on the water deserted—not a soul on board."
"You don't mean it!" ejaculated Fred. "What's her name?"
"The Mermaid."
"Creation!" shouted Harold Bird. "Why, that's the steam yacht was advertised in all the newspapers some weeks ago. She was missing, and the club that owns her offered a reward of five thousand dollars for information leading to her return."
"Well, we picked her up as a derelict," said Tom. "And we'll claim salvage accordingly. But how did she disappear?"