“Of course not,” admitted Clay, doubtfully. “He’s above anything of that kind, you know. He’s as honest a boy as ever lived!”
“If he has put the money in another place,” began Alex, but Case, still in bad humor, interrupted him.
“What a pleasant world this would be if there were no if words in it! Someone said, not long ago, that if it wasn’t for that word he could put Paris in a bottle! He meant, of course, if Paris was smaller or the bottle was larger. If he has put the money in another place!”
“I wonder why he doesn’t come?” Alex put in. “We left him here to look after things, you know.”
“He wasn’t here when I came,” Clay contributed. “Everything was just as you see it now, only there wasn’t any supper cooking, as there is now. He never went off like this before.”
There was an apparatus on board the Rambler for making electricity when the boat was under way, but, this being inoperative during the winter, the boys had caused the motor boat to be wired so the light came from the city lines. The cooking was partly done by electricity, the stove being concealed in a false couch at the back of the cabin. During the cold weather the cabin had been warmed by a tiny, soft-coal stove which now stood near the door, and some of the cooking had been done on that.
A smell of burning meat now filled the room, and Clay hastened to switch off the current. The coffee, neglected, was bubbling over on the coils of wire at the bottom of the stove, and he set the coffee-pot on the floor.
“I don’t think I want any supper right now,” he declared.
“I’m not going to lose my supper,” argued Alex. “I’ve lost my job and my trip to the Amazon, but I’m not going to lose my supper. These sausages are all right yet.”
“I haven’t lost my trip to the Amazon,” Clay gritted, his jaws setting. “Nor Jule hasn’t lost his trip, or his one chance of life! I’ll have to think out some way, but I’m going, and Jule’s going with me!”