“Did they carry acid just in case?” Dick could not restrain his tendency to tease.
“I think it was something they meant to throw on anybody who tried to stop them.”
“Golly-gracious! That might be,” Larry exclaimed.
“Anyhow, they discovered the false emeralds and tried to destroy them.” Sandy was more confident at Larry’s acceptance of his ideas.
“They managed to get somebody on the yacht,” Sandy guessed, “and then to be sure that there was no hitch, divided into three groups—Jeff, possibly the ringleader after all, in his airplane, two in the seaplane, the other two in the amphibian.”
“The confederate on the yacht was to secure the gems, somehow, and they must have had a radio somewhere to get messages,” Larry was beginning to see daylight and to concur with Sandy’s opinions.
“Yes,” Sandy nodded, “and they all went to the appointed place——”
“But Jeff interfered with the amphibian,” objected Dick, “and you forget to account for the two men in the hydroplane.”
“I think it came out the way it does in books,” Sandy declared. “Each set wanted those emeralds, and they tried to outdo one another—and maybe the hydroplane was the honest one of the lot, with Mr. Everdail’s—the real one’s—caretaker, summoned by the captain.”
“But Jeff had us signal them,” Dick said.