The professor called a meeting, and it was unanimously decided to wing back and find out how the island of the dead had fared. They reached the spot by noon, and sailed over the peaks and gazed down into the place where the island should have been.
But no island was there!
It had vanished as completely as if it had been a dream. Only the waters of the lake rippled as placidly as of yore, hiding forever under their azure surface the city that had been and now was not.
Silent and stunned the adventurers turned the Discoverer’s prow toward the westward once more.
“If it wasn’t for those relics in the cabin,” said Nat pensively, “I should think that we’d dreamed it all.”
As he spoke he looked back toward the far horizon. Already the ragged peaks were fading on the sky and soon would be out of sight.
“After all,” said the professor at length, “perhaps it is better so than if that noble city of a vanished race had become the resort of gossiping tourists.”
And in after days they agreed with him; but with Nat and Joe it was long a bitter thought that they had left in the Temple of the Moon some of the most marvelous remains of an ancient civilization ever discovered.
The untimely ending of the existence of the wonderful island put an end also to the Motor Rangers’ aerial adventures, for the professor decided to abandon all attempts at relocating it and employing divers, as had been his first intention.