"If there is anybody at work on the wreck," Ned replied, "they may beremoving the gold or they may be searching the vessel forincriminating documents."
"I guess any documents found down there will be pretty wet," laughedJack.
"They may be in sealed boxes," Ned replied. "Anyway, if there areimportant documents on board they might be rendered legible by properand judicious handling." "Here we go, then," Jack exclaimed. "I'llexpel the water in the tanks until the Sea Lion rests at the rightaltitude, over the wreck, and we can enter by way of the decks."
"But what will the other fellows be doing while we are getting intoposition?" asked Frank.
"Gettin' ready to cut our lines, probably," interposed Jimmie.
"That's a fact," Jack said. "If there are men working in the ship theymust be supplied with air by a submarine. How could that be done, I'dlike to know."
"They might anchor the submarine some distance away," replied Ned,"and lay an air-hose along the bottom. If attached to the hose leadinginto the helmets before being placed, two or three might work fromsuch a supply, and such a system, too, would obviate a good deal ofthe danger to be feared from crossed lines."
"You've got it all figured out!" cried Jimmie.
"Well," Frank intervened, "I'll bet that he has it right. Those Moorepersons were not born yesterday."
"That's right," Jack admitted. "We saw enough of the Captain in theBlack Bear club-room in New York to know that he is an expert in thesubmarine business. He may be an imitation fop and a bounder, as hewould say, but he certainly is next to his job."
"Why wouldn't it be a good idea to sneak around in our water suitsuntil we find the lines an' cut them?" asked Jimmie.
"That would be plain murder," Ned replied.
"I guess they wouldn't hesitate long if the conditions were reversed,"Frank suggested, "still, I wouldn't like to be in with anything asbrutal as that."
"Come to think of it," Jimmie admitted, "I wouldn't, either."
"I don't get the idea of these incriminating documents," Jack said, ina moment. "That is one thing I did not pay attention to in the talkwith Captain Moore at the clubroom."
"What he said was this," Ned explained. "The Government is accused, incertain hostile foreign circles, of conspiring with the leaders of therevolution now brewing in China. He declared that the Washingtonofficials were even charged with sending the gold to the rebels by theroundabout way of the present Chinese Government."
"You'll have to come again!" laughed Frank. "I'm dense as to that partof it. It is too subtle for me."
"Me, too," Jimmie asserted.
"All I know about it," Ned answered, "is that Captain Moore declaredthat the rebel leaders were purposely posted as to the shipment of thegold, and that they were to seize it as soon as it left the protectionof the American flag, if they could. At least they were to be given achance to do so."
"Even in that case," Frank reasoned, "the Washington people wouldn'tbe foolish enough to place incriminating papers with the shipment. Thewhole scheme might fail, you know."
"It does look pretty fishy," Ned remarked, "but the ways of diplomacyare often crooked ways. Anyway, it is claimed by some that the mailboat was rammed, that it was no accident that sent her to keep companywith McGinty at the bottom of the sea."
Jack expelled the water from the tanks of the Sea Lion until theinstruments in the machine room showed her to be near the surface,and, as Ned estimated, directly above the wreck. Then an anchor wassent out, to prevent any possible drifting, and Ned, Frank and Jackput on their helmets again.
The lines used for signaling and the air-hose had both been spliced,and it was figured that any part of the wreck could now be visited.The drop lines were also longer, and the machinery for hauling thedivers up on signal was made ready for use.
"We can't walk out and in the Sea Lion now," Ned said, "and a gooddeal depends on the vigilance of the boy left in the boat. Watch forthe slightest signal, Jimmie," he warned.
The touching of a lever unwound the lifting and lowering lines whenall was ready, and in a minute the three boys found themselves on theupper deck of the wreck. It was tilted at an angle of about twentydegrees, so great care was exercised in traversing it.
As Jimmie swung the lever which lowered the three boys he peered outof a darkened window. He saw only the dim surface light.
"They've got sense enough not to show any light," he mused, "so thethieves won't know what is going on unless they see the shadowoverhead, or run into one of the fellows."
Leaving Frank, as the most cautious of the boys, to guard the linesand air-hose when they touched sharp angles, Ned, accompanied by Jack,advanced down the main companionway and was soon in the large andhandsomely furnished cabin.
Then the electric searchlights were put to use, and the greatapartment lay partly exposed to view. Their entrance into the roomseemed to create something like a current in the water, and articlesof light weight came driving at them.
Ned turned sick and faint as a dead body lifted from the floor and aghastly face was turned toward his own. A few unfortunate ones hadgone down with the ship, and most of the bodies lay in this cabin.
Those who had remained on deck until the final plunge had, of course,drifted away. However, the boy soon recovered his equilibrium, andwent about his work courageously, notwithstanding the fact that manyterrifying forms of marine life swam and squirmed around him.
Clinging to heavy tables and chairs to prevent slipping, the boys madetheir way to that part of the ship where, according to their drawings,the captain's cabin had been. Their first duty was to make search forany sealed papers which might be there.
The room was located at last, and then Ned motioned to Jack toextinguish his light. The boy obeyed orders with a feeling of dread.
It was dark as the bottomless pit in the cabin now, and fishes andsquirming things brushed against his legs and rubbed against the linewhich was supplying him with air.
In all the experiences of the Boy Scouts nothing like this had everbeen encountered before. In Mexico, in the Philippines, in the GreatNorthwest, in the Canal Zone, in the cold air far above the roof ofthe world, they had usually been in touch with all the great facts ofNature, but now they seemed separated from all mankind--buried in afathomless pit filled with unclean things.
The door of the captain's cabin was closed. Ned put his ear againstit, then reached out and took Jack by the arm. The latter understoodthe order and crowded close.
From the other side came sharp blows, and through the keyhole came theglow of illuminated water. Ned's worst fears were realized. Some onehad reached the wreck in advance of his party.
He knew that he could not justly be censured for the activity of hisenemies, and yet the thought that he was in danger of failing in hismission brought the hot blood surging to his head. He did not stop atthat time to deliberate as to how the hostile forces had gained thisadvantage in time.
He did not even try to solve the problem as to the personality of thehostile element. The men working on the other side of the door to thecaptain's cabin might have crossed the Pacific in the Diver, or theymight have been recruited from foreign seaports.
The question did not particularly interest him. The point with him wasthat they were there.
And, now, what course ought he to pursue? For a time, as he stoodagainst the door, he could reach no conclusion.
Directly, however, the important question presented by the unusualsituation came to the boy's mind. It was this:
Where was the boat into which the workers on the other side of thedoor proposed to remove the plunder?
The Diver, or some other efficient submarine must be close at hand.The men who were searching the captain's room were being supplied withair from some source.
And here was another question:
Had the gold already been removed?
It seemed to Ned that the first thing for him to do was to locate thesubmarine. For all he knew, prowlers from her might be nosing aroun
dthe Sea Lion.
He had left the door to the water chamber open, of course, and so itmust remain until he returned. Jimmie, owing to a defect afterwardscorrected, could not expel the water while the door was open, norcould he close the door from the interior.
Fearful that some mischief was on foot, he grasped Jack by the arm andhastened back to where Frank had been left. His first care should beto find the exact location of the hostile submarine and then see thatno air-hose reached from her to the Sea Lion.
The three boys passed out of the wreck and came to the stern of theonce fine ship. She had gone down prow first, and the stern was alittle above the level sand floor of the sea.
Instead of passing around the stern and coming out on the other side,the boys halted and crouched down, so as to see under the keel. As theouter shell of the ship was here at least a yard above the bottom, itwas plain that the cargo had swept forward when she went down, thusholding her by the nose.
There was no longer any doubt as to what was going on. There, only afew yards away, lay the dark bulk of a submarine. Only for a lightglimmering through the closed door of the water chamber it could nothave been seen at all.
The men who were working in the wreck had taken no chances in leavingthe boat. Their lines and air-hose passed through the outer door inwell-guarded openings, and the interior was as safe from intrusion asa walled-in fortress.
Ned regretted that he had not observed the same precaution in leavingthe Sea Lion, still he did not believe that his boat had beenattacked. After a few moments devoted to observation, Ned crept aroundthe keel and looked down the side of the ship which lay toward thesubmarine. Men with electric lamps in their helmets were workingthere.
They appeared to be forcing an entrance into the lower hold of theship through a small break in the shell. This led him to theconclusion that the way to the very bottom was blocked from theinside, and that the gold--if it had been stored there--had not yetbeen removed.
He returned to his chums and all three started back to the Sea Lion.The men about the wreck were all so busy that it did not seem to Nedthat they knew of the presence there of his submarine.
Still, he searched the bottom, as he passed along, with both hands andfeet for any line which, leaving the stranger, might be leading to herrival. Finally he discovered, much to his annoyance, a hauling lineand an air-hose leading in the direction he was going.
"I'm afraid," he thought, "that Jimmie is in trouble."
CHAPTER IX
"JIMMIE'S FOOLISH--LIKE A FOX"