“There are men leaving the island, sir,” the sailor said. “Perhaps we did get hold of the wrong fellows.”
“I should think you did,” laughed the captain, “but there may be time to correct the error. Signal to the steamer for more men, and drift down in your boats. You may be able to capture some of those outlaws, and,” he added with a smile as the sailor turned away, “don’t forget that there is a reward offered for every one of them.”
“Perhaps we’d better go with the men,” suggested Case. “We aren’t anxious to get where there’s shooting going on, but we need the money.”
“I prefer,” the captain replied, “that you come on board the Sybil with me. I’ll have the cook get up a fine breakfast, and you boys can tell me all about your river trips. I have always been interested in such journeys and have long planned to take one myself.”
The boys readily agreed to this arrangement, Alex declaring that it would save the washing of at least one mess of dishes, and all were soon seated in the captain’s cosy room.
“I’ll wait here an hour,” Captain Morgan said, “to give my men a chance to gather in some of the rewards, but after that I must be on my way. We shall be late now, on account of this delay.”
The boys briefly described their river trips on the Amazon, the Columbia, the Colorado and the Mississippi, and were rewarded with a breakfast which Alex admitted was almost as good as he could cook himself.
“And now,” Clay said, as they all stood on the deck, watching the sailors returning empty-handed from their quest of the outlaws, “I wish you would tell me what all this rural free delivery business we’ve encountered means. We’ve been puzzling over it all night.”
As he spoke he handed the first letter—the one delivered by the mysterious canoeist—to the captain, who smiled as he looked at it.
“I’ll tell you about that,” he said. “There is a man over in Quebec who claims that he owns about half of the province under a grant of land made to Jacques Cartier in 1541 by Francis I. of France. This grant, or charter, he claims, was confirmed to his family, the Fontenelles, in 1603 by Samuel de Champlain, who was sent to Canada by de Chaste, upon whom King Louis XIII. had generously bestowed about half of the new world.