“I’ll do better than that.”
“You will?”
“Yes. We can take this one. I scent a good story here. Luckily I can run a craft of this kind to the queen’s taste. Lockyer was in a row boat. If we get a wiggle on, we may be able to overtake them before they land. You know where they are going?”
“Yes; to the old Banta House,” responded Ned. “Here, Herc, dive below and get some pistols; we may need them. Tell the foreman what we are about to do. Tom, we’ll need you along, for we may have a desperate fight on our hands.”
“I’ve got a gun of my own,” volunteered the reporter.
“I don’t know how to thank you for helping us out,” exclaimed Ned. “You happened along in the nick of time.”
“Don’t thank me,” laughed the reporter. “This thing will make a cracking good story and beat for my paper.”
Herc was soon back on deck. With him came Andy Bowler. The latter was full of questions, but Ned only spared time to give him the merest outline of their mission.
“I guess this is against rules and regulations,” he said, as they tumbled into the boat, “but it’s in line of duty, and we’ve got to see it through.”
Five minutes later they were swishing through the water in the newspaper man’s hired motor boat—a handy little craft, capable of doing her twelve miles without heating up a bearing.