"Well, the best thing I can do is to amuse myself," he remarked, as he left the lawyer's office. He strolled back to the hotel, intending to take a bath, and don a new suit he had just received from the tailor. As he went up to the desk to get the key of his room, the clerk handed him a letter, with the remark:
"Messenger left that for you a little while ago, Mr. Hamilton."
Dick read it hastily. It said:
"Dear Mr. Hamilton: I am trying to hurry along matters concerned with the purchase of your yacht. I have seen the present owners, but there appears to be a slight hitch, to use a nautical term. I have another vessel in view, in case we can not get the one you want. I expect to be aboard her this morning. Could you meet me on her? She is the Princess, and is anchored off One Hundred and Eightieth Street. Suppose you run up there? You will find a launch at the dock to bring you out. I think, in case we can not secure the Albatross, that you will like this vessel fully as well. Come if you can.
"Yours sincerely,
"James Blake."
"Can't get the Albatross!" thought Dick, in dismay. "That will be too bad! I'll never care for any other yacht as I did for her. But I suppose I'd better go and see Mr. Blake. Queer, though, that they didn't tell me in the office how things were. Maybe they didn't know, or this may have cropped up after I left. I'll go and see the other boat, anyhow."
Dick started for the anchorage of the Princess, and, as he was about to engage a taxicab, he bethought himself of the old sailor on the Albatross.
"Widdy would be just the one to take along," reasoned Dick. "He knows all about yachts—more than either Mr. Blake or myself. I've a good notion to go get him, and see what he has to say. Even if we do have to take a different craft from the Albatross, I'd like Widdy to sail with me. I'll go get him."
The old sailor, who knew nothing of the hitch in the arrangements to sell the yacht he was on, was a bit surprised at Dick's proposition, but readily agreed to accompany him. He left one of his on-shore acquaintances in charge of the Albatross.
"But as fer findin' as good a boat as that," said Widdy, waving his hand toward her, as he and Dick were speeding shoreward in a motor launch, "you can't do it. Split my lee scuppers if you can!"
And Dick, with a sigh, agreed with him. His heart was set on the Albatross.