“So it was the same Tyler after all,” smiled Jack, after they had all been introduced.
“It certainly is a small world,” declared Mr. Morse smilingly. “So this is the lad whose uncle designed this wonderful craft and left him the plans of it! My boy, you have a legacy worth more than a great deal of money.”
“We think so at any rate,” said Ned, smiling at his chums.
“But where in the world have you been hiding yourself?” asked Henry Tyler of Ned Nevins as they prepared to get under way, having transferred a few instruments, and so forth, from the Sky Eagle.
“Why, have you been looking for me?” asked Ned in some surprise.
“Yes, for weeks. But I could obtain no clew to your whereabouts. No one in Millville appeared to know what had become of you.”
“I have been at Nestorville with my two good friends, Jack Chadwick and Tom Jesson. Had it not been for them the Electric Monarch would never have been built,” said Ned, gratefully.
“I wanted to deliver to you a package left in my care by your uncle not long before he died,” said Tyler. “He charged me to give it to you after his death, which, it seemed, he felt was not far off. I have kept it with me always, hoping some time to meet you and now I can at last deliver it into the hands of its rightful owner.”
Ned, with some wonderment, took from Tyler’s hands a long yellow envelope. He had no time to open it just then, for Jack ordered all hands to their posts for the return voyage. They had hardly risen into the air before the Sky Eagle was seen to settle down upon the water with a sliding motion.
Suddenly she gave a swoop downward and the next instant the sea had hidden her from view.