CHAPTER XXVI.
LOOKING FOR THEIR CHUM.
We left Harry Ware, Percy Simmons and the three customs inspectors sadly baffled on the dock of the Piquetville Yacht Club. Their search for the River Swallow, it will be recalled, had revealed nothing of the craft. Several inquiries made in the vicinity had met with the same disheartening results.
Sick at heart and worried more than they cared to confess, Harry and Percy listened to the consultation going on between the three experienced servants of Uncle Sam’s revenue service.
“If that fellow La Rue is on board, there is no telling what may have happened,” said Jennings. “He is a desperate man, as we have good cause to know.”
“But he is a coward at heart,” struck in Adams. “Remember how he showed the white feather in that affair of the Chinese smuggling three years ago?”
“Yes, he secured immunity from punishment by turning state’s evidence on his accomplices,” rejoined Jennings. “It was too bad he was allowed to go. There’ll always be plenty of work for us as long as he is at large.”
“It’s odd, the way he’s managed to slip through the toils so many times,” commented Prescott, the third customs man. “Why, the government has had its hands upon him half a dozen times, and yet he has always managed to get away in some mysterious manner.”
“There’s one member of the bunch, though, that I’d rather get than all the rest,” declared Jennings.
“Who is that?”
“Rawson.”