Matt felt that the Sprite, with certain changes, could beat anything on the lakes. Lorry shared his confidence, and Matt was working night and day to get the swift little eighteen-foot launch in shape for "warming up" on the water before the regatta.
The theft of the drawings was the first backset Matt and Lorry had received. Well aware of Merton's questionable character, it was easy for the lads to believe that he had slipped into the boathouse while they were up the bank and had taken the plans; or he need only have come to the window and reach in in order to help himself to them.
Lorry was terribly cut up.
"Merton has got the better of us," he muttered disconsolately. "He'll know just what we're going to do with the Sprite now, and will make changes in the Wyandotte, or else arrange for another boat to stack up against us. It's too late for us to order another boat, and we'll have to go on with the Sprite and look at Merton's heels over the finish line. Oh, thunder! I wish this Chink and that Pickerel Pete were in the bottom of the lake!"
Noticing the scowl Lorry gave him, Ping slunk away from his vicinity, and came closer to where Matt was walking thoughtfully back and forth across the floor of the boathouse.
"Don't lose your nerve, Lorry," counseled Matt, coming to a halt and leaning against the work-bench. "No fellow ever won a fight unless he went into it with confidence."
"It's all well enough to talk of confidence," grumbled Lorry, "but this is enough to undermine all the hopes we ever had."
"Looked at in one way, yes. Those were my working drawings. They contained all the measurements of the Sprite's hull, my plans for changing the gasoline tanks from the bow aft where they would not bring the boat down so much by the head, also my arrangement for a new reversing-gear, the dimensions of the motor, and the size and pitch of our new propeller."
Lorry groaned.
"Why, confound it!" he cried, "Merton will be able to figure out just what the Sprite's speed should be—and he can plan accordingly for another boat. There's a way of getting those plans away from him, by Jupiter!" He started angrily to his feet.