"Oh, but this is great news!" he gasped. "We've finally got the Navy Department awake. This dispatch inquires how soon we can be ready to run the 'Pollard' through an exhaustive trial trip with a board of Naval officers aboard. Do you grasp it, Jack? If the trial succeeds we'll sell our first boat to the Government and be on the high road to success and fortune! Oh, this is the grandest news! It overshadows everything else!"
It truly did.
CHAPTER XIII
ON TRAIL AS YOUNG EXPERTS
Very early the next morning Jacob Farnum sent the following telegram to the Navy Department at Washington:
"Send board of officers as soon as you desire. Everything in readiness. Advise me promptly, and how many will be in party."
Then, knowing that he could not expect to hear from the national capital for at least several hours, and feeling that he simply must have something absorbing on his, hands, the boatbuilder turned his attention to following up the business of the night before.
He soon learned, through means of his own, that Don Melville had engaged a driver and had left Dunhaven during the night.
"Pooh!" snapped the boatbuilder. "If we want that young man, detectives will find him sooner or later. Or else, he'll be compelled to hide at the ends of the earth, so that he'll give us no further trouble."
The young stranger at the lock-up steadfastly refused to admit that he was David Pollard's burglar of the night before. Naturally, therefore, he failed to disclose what had become of the envelope of drawings stolen from the inventor's room.