Both Brighton lads stopped short in their tracks. They had expected to see something pretentious. Instead, here was anchored a flat wide-beamed vessel that at first glance looked for all the world like a car-float with the superstructure of a ferry boat. It might have been a houseboat at one time in its career.
But what particularly struck the fancy of the boys was a strange ram-like nose that projected straight out from the bow of this odd-looking craft. At this distance it looked like a series of huge steel cistern sections linked together after the fashion of a long sewer system. For approximately a hundred feet this cylindrical projection extended out from the bow of the Jules Verne. Less than a third of it was exposed to view, the remainder being under water. At the end it terminated in a queer flatiron-shaped turret something like eight or ten feet across at the back and tapering forward to a thin prow of inches.
Truly this was a strange looking outfit! Never in all their maritime experience had the boys seen anything like it.
"You sure have one on me," faltered Dick as he surveyed the craft.
Jay was shaking his head too. "Might be the houseboat on the Styx so far as my store of knowledge is concerned."
Captain Austin turned to Larry Seymour. "What do you think of her?"
"Nix for me, Captain; you have me buffaloed," was all Larry could hazard.
Captain Austin laughed aloud.
"I thought you chaps would be surprised. Well, now let's see. The Jules Verne is the mother ship"—he pointed out the "houseboat" that had first caught the eyes of the boys. "She is nothing more than an old Fall River liner that we bought in and converted into our own uses. She is simply the base of operations. We live on the Jules Verne. She takes us wherever we want to go and she is entirely seaworthy, I assure you.