"Well, good night, folks!" called Alvin to the happy family. "Come, Chester."
The two went out together, wondering who the caller could be. The brief distance was quickly traversed, and, passing through the front door, they turned into the handsomely furnished library.
As the lads entered, a man rose.
"You are Alvin Landon, I believe," he inquired, "and you," turning to his companion, "are his friend, Chester Haynes."
If ever two youths were astonished, when they made courteous reply to the salutation, they were our young friends, for the caller who thus addressed them was the man in gray that had followed them to the inlet on Barter Island and had now come to Alvin's home at Southport.
"If you can spare me a few minutes I have something of importance to say to you," he added as he took the seat to which Alvin waved him.
It proved an important interview indeed, but the revelation made by the man in gray and the events which followed there-from will be told in the second volume of the Launch Boys Series entitled "The Launch Boys' Adventures in Northern Waters."