For several hours Jim was seen no more on deck, and many a merry quip was bandied at his expense. What Jim was doing will appear later.
“It is certainly out of the ordinary,” admitted Becket. He had just come aft to where the professor was consulting with Jo and Tom. They had been discussing the action of the Marjorie, the ship which had taken its departure from San Francisco on the same day and very hour that they had sailed, and which had again been sighted when they left San Matteo. She was trailing about a mile astern of them, and here it was the third day since they had sailed.
“She has been following us right along,” observed Tom. “Do you think she is going the same way we are?”
“A man might be justified in thinking so,” replied Berwick, dryly.
“I mean,” corrected Tom, “to the island?”
“I don’t know what to think,” admitted the professor, “but I don’t like it somehow.”
“It is queer,” reiterated the engineer.
“Let us run away from him,” suggested Jim, who now joined them.
“I have tried to outsail him, but it’s no use,” returned the captain. “She is burning up the coal, yet only traveling as fast as we do under sail.”
“Suppose we try again and see if she is really following us.”