"I'm not going to admit that we're lost," declared Mark stoutly.
"Hu! You're like the Indian," spoke Jack. "The Indian who got lost in the woods. He insisted that it wasn't he who was lost, that it was his wigwam that couldn't be found. He knew where he himself was all the while. That's our case, I suppose. We're here, but the projectile is lost."
"Ha! ha!" laughed Andy Sudds. "That's a pretty good joke!"
"But not being able to find the projectile is no joke," went on Mark, who always took matters more seriously than did his chum. "What are we going to do?" he added. "We can't stay here like this."
"Maybe we'll have to," declared Jack. "We certainly can't get off the moon—at least, not until we reach the projectile, and I'd like to discover those diamonds before we go back."
"Hu! Those diamonds!" exploded Mark. "I think this whole thing is a wild-goose chase, anyhow! If it hadn't been for those diamonds we wouldn't have come to the moon. I don't believe there are any diamonds here, anyhow."
"Well, I can't prove it to you now, but I will before we get back," asserted Jack. "We'll be wearing diamonds, as the song says."
"Diamonds aren't going to keep us warm when we're freezing," went on Mark, who seemed bound to look on the dark side, "and we can't eat 'em when we're hungry. A lot of good they'll do us if we do find them!"
"Oh, cheer up!" suggested Jack cheerfully. "And, speaking of eating, what's the matter with having some lunch? What did we bring it along for if we're not going to eat? Let's begin."
His good spirits were contagious, not that Andy needed any special cheering up, but Mark did. In a few minutes they were seated on some rugged rocks, and, with their life-torches stuck in cracks, so that the perforated metal boxes of chemicals would be on a level with their faces, they opened the baskets they had been fore-sighted enough to bring with them.