The Brighton Boys in the Submarine Treasure Ship

by James R. Driscoll

SEVERAL days had elapsed since the capture of the mysterious pirate ship and her motley crew. The Jules Verne had remained on the job at Martha's Vineyard while her divers carefully combed the interior of the old sunken British liner Dominion to find whether any of the gold bullion still remained in her hold. Relentless search, however, had disclosed no more of the precious booty—all of it had been ferreted out by the arch-conspirator, Carl Weddigen, diver extraordinary, adventurer, spy and piratical chief. But all of it in turn had been reclaimed from the interior of the Monterey, the fast auxiliary that Weddigen had commanded.

The fight on the Monterey had been short and sweet. Taken unexpectedly by the surprise attack of Captain Fowler and his men from the U. S. revenue cutter Marblehead, the men of the Monterey, deprived of the leadership of Weddigen, who was a captive on the Jules Verne, had given up at the first show of strength on the part of the government forces. Two huge motor launches, armed with two-pounders and machine guns, had come swooping down upon the Monterey. Although the crew of the Monterey were well armed with modern rifles and ammunition, they had hastily thrown down their arms at the first withering fire from the launches of the Marblehead. This fire had swept the decks of the pirate craft, killing two of her crew and wounding others.

Immediately the Monterey had been searched. Just as Jay Thacker, diver aboard the Jules Verne, had related to Captain Austin and to Captain Fowler, of the Marblehead, the gold bars—a dozen and more crates of them—had been found aboard the pirate craft. Thousands of dollars' worth of precious metal that would have been spirited off by Weddigen and his crew unless the resourceful salvagers from Bridgeford had intervened.

"Lucky thing you called us in time," Captain Fowler declared.

"Yes, and a lucky thing you were near," said Captain Austin. Which was true, indeed, considering that the Jules Verne and her crew could hardly have hoped to prevent the escape of the pirates.

And then came the unfolding of the story of Carl Weddigen. Yes, it was Carl himself; the same ingenious plotter who had first entered the service of the Bridgeford Salvage Company with the idea of gaining information as to where treasure ships were submerged; the same intriguer who had hoped to profit through his own thefts while ostensibly working for Superintendent Brown and Captain Austin; the same despicable traitor who had been thwarted in the act of stealing valued U. S. Government plans taken from the lost U-boat at Cape May.

Carefully and noting every particular, Captain Fowler, who was in fact a policeman of the high seas, had heard from Captain Austin, and from his star divers, Jay Thacker and Dick Monaghan, the whole story of Carl Weddigen. The Brighton boys started with their first encounter with Carl in the plant of the Bridgeford Company. They told of the first experience on the Dominion when Carl had been discovered in the act of secreting diamonds in his diving suit, and how he was compelled to disgorge through the craftiness of Larry Seymour. The affair off Cape May was related, and this was the most damaging evidence, for it proved the fellow an enemy of the United States Government.

"It surely will go hard with this chap after we turn him over to the Department of Justice at Washington," Captain Fowler had ventured in an opinion on the future status of the prisoner. For Carl was now a prisoner aboard the Marblehead, closely confined under constant guard in such a way that he could not possibly escape.

At first Weddigen had been sullen and close-mouthed. Repeated efforts to get him to tell his story had failed; how he had fitted out his pirate craft, where he had got the speedy little vessel, and how he had shipped his crew; and, finally, how he had cleaned out the Dominion. But now that he had come to realize that he was literally "up against it" and that he was to be delivered over to the United States Government to face a court trial and possible death for espionage and high crimes against the government, to say nothing of his plots against the lives of the men of the Jules Verne, the German prisoner had decided to tell his own story in the hope that it might in some way mitigate the whole case against him.