Jack hated to leave his folks, but there was another pang in his heart which, however, he took good care to keep to himself. He had risked a telegram to Ruth, stating that he was going on the quest, and he had hoped for some sort of reply in return. But up to the hour of sailing no word had been received from the girl who was so dear to his heart.
And up to the hour of sailing no additional information had come in concerning those who were supposed to be responsible for the hold-up in Wall Street. Not a trace of the Browns or the Martells, nor of Ditini and Ronombo, had been received. So far as could be ascertained none of the securities stolen had been offered for sale. Evidently the bandits and all in league with them were keeping well under cover or else they had left for foreign parts.
All of their baggage had been sent to the Firefly the day before, and the boys had arranged with Captain Corning regarding the staterooms they were to use. These rooms were two double ones on one side of the cabin of the yacht. On the other side were staterooms used by the captain and his mate. There were other staterooms further back, and these were assigned to Leif Olesen and his assistant, Nick Amend.
The boys had met the head diver twice, and he appeared to be a man who understood his business, but also a fellow who was far from sociable. But as the diver had not been hired for his society, this lack of sociability counted for nothing with them.
“All we want of him is to locate the wreck and get up the treasure for us,” was the way Fred had expressed himself. “If he’ll do that, he can look as sour as he pleases.”
It did not take the yacht long to run down into the Bay and past the Statue of Liberty, and that evening found them on the rolling waters of the Atlantic heading southward along the New Jersey coast.
“Hope we don’t run into any more bootleggers,” was Randy’s comment. He had not forgotten the trouble occasioned by doing this at the time they had tried to make their way in a motor boat from Nantucket to Cape Cod, as related in “The Rover Boys Shipwrecked.”
“Well, we’ll have to take what comes,” answered Jack.
Only a few fishing vessels came anywhere near them. A coastwise steamer from the south was in the offing, but kept several miles away.
Not to be short-handed in case there was work to do in trying to raise the Margarita or to get what was aboard the sunken steam yacht, Captain Corning had shipped a crew of twelve men, so that there was little or nothing for the Rover boys to do while the vessel was plowing on her way southward. They visited the engineer and his assistant, and also looked in on the cook in the galley, and even took short turns at the wheel in company with the captain and the mate.