Chapter VI: The Cape Town Mystery

On their way to the hotel, Matt and Townsend met Dick Ferral. Carl, after exchanging his bathing suit for every-day clothes, had wandered about looking for Matt, and had only just come to the air ship to relieve Ferral. In a few words Matt told his chum what had happened, and Ferral accompanied Matt and Townsend to the hotel.

"You and Matt own the Hawk together, don't you, Ferral?" Townsend had asked.

"That's the way of it," Ferral had answered.

"Then I want to talk with the two of you."

These remarks merely served to whet the curiosity of the two boys.

On reaching the hotel, the three repaired at once to the boys' room, and after Matt had got into some dry clothing and all were seated comfortably, Townsend plunged at once into the subject that lay nearest his mind.

"It is clear to me," said he, "that Jurgens mixed up in this moving-picture business just for a 'blind.' He must have heard that I was coming to Atlantic City for a look at your air ship, King, and have laid his plans for the capture of the submarine. The _Grampus_, as near as I can figure out, was captured by confederates of Jurgens' while I was in the air with you. Jurgens had no idea that he would be able to secure that paper from me direct, but probably hoped to find it in the _Grampus_, or to take it from me when I returned to the submarine after that flight in the Hawk."

"If Jurgens' men captured the _Grampus_ while you were in the air with us, Mr. Townsend," said Matt, "the capture must have been effected in broad daylight, while the Inlet was alive with sailing craft. Would that have been possible?"

"Easily possible. The _Grampus_ is a steel shell, you know, and what takes place aboard of her cannot be seen by any one on the outside. The skipper of the _Crescent_ happened to be a friend of Jurgens', and the _Crescent_ happened to be handily by to pick Jurgens out of the rowboat. We'll know more about that part of it as soon as McMillan investigates and reports. Just now, the point for us to remember is that luck has been with Jurgens. His men captured the submarine, Jurgens captured the paper, and the _Crescent_, with her skipper and crew, helped Jurgens and his clique to foil the ends of right and justice."

Townsend paused. He was a man of fifty-five or sixty, with gray mustache and gray hair, but with alert and piercing black eyes. His looks and manner were such as to inspire confidence, and both Matt and Dick felt that he was to be trusted implicitly.

"But why has Jurgens gone to all this trouble?" inquired Matt. "He has made himself a thief and a fugitive, and what does he hope to gain by it?"

"Ah," returned Townsend, "now you are touching upon the mystery of the Man from Cape Town. I shall have to tell you about that before you can get any clear understanding of what Jurgens has done.

"Nearly a year ago a ragged specimen of a man stopped me at the corner of Broad and Chestnut Streets, Philadelphia, and asked if I wasn't the man named Townsend who had invented and was then building a new submarine which was to have a cruising radius of several thousand miles. I told him that I was. Thereupon the stranger informed me that he was the Man from Cape Town, and that he wanted to borrow a dollar.

"The Man from Cape Town was very different from your ordinary beggar, and I handed him the dollar. Thereupon he took a folded paper from his coat, gave it to me, and asked me to keep it for him. He declared, gravely enough, that the paper was worth a fortune, and that when my submarine was completed, we would go in her to the place where the fortune had been tucked away, find it and divide it between us.

"That sort of talk led me to look upon the Man from Cape Town as a harmless lunatic. I discovered that the paper was a chart of the Bahama Islands, and that it gave the latitude and longitude of a particular island, together with other information necessary for the finding of what purported to be an iron chest.

"This chart I looked upon as rank moonshine, and tucked it away in a pigeonhole of my desk. Months passed, and I had almost forgotten the Man from Cape Town, his chart and his iron chest, when something occurred to bring the entire matter prominently to my mind.

"A night watchman at the yard where I was building the _Grampus_ found a man going through my desk at midnight. When the fellow was captured, he was just getting away with a paper which he had abstracted from one of the pigeonholes. That paper was the chart, and the would-be thief was--Jurgens, Lattimer Jurgens.

"Jurgens had been a workman in the shipyard, but had been discharged for incompetency. While at the yard I presume he learned, in some manner known only to himself, that I had possession of the chart, that it was in my desk, and that it purported to locate a fortune.

"While Jurgens' attempted theft recalled the chart to my mind, it did not add anything to its importance in my estimation, for Jurgens was just the sort of man to take stock in such wild yarns about hidden treasure; however, in order to keep the chart from being stolen, I put it away in the office safe. As for Jurgens, I let him go with a warning.

"About three weeks after that I was called hurriedly to one of the city hospitals. There I found the Man from Cape Town, a total wreck and lying at the point of death. He had strength enough left to insist that the iron chest contained a fortune, and he made me promise to start for the Bahamas as soon as the _Grampus_ was finished, find the chest, and then take it to his daughter, who lived in New Orleans, open it in her presence, and divide the contents equally.

"I still considered the Unknown as the subject of delusions; but, as I should want to try out the _Grampus_ on a long cruise as soon as she was completed, I agreed to carry out the man's request. He died blessing me so fervently that I was a little ashamed of myself for not having more faith in his story.

"A few days, perhaps a week, later, Jurgens came to see me. He declared that the Man from Cape Town had been his brother, and that the chest, now that his brother was dead, belonged to him. I asked Jurgens where the chest came from, what it contained, and how it had happened to be cached in the Bahamas. These questions he could not answer. I had been fairly sure, all along, that Jurgens was not telling the truth, and his lack of information made me positive of it. I declined to give him the chart, or to treat with him in any way regarding it. Thereupon Jurgens left me, vowing vengeance, and asserting that, by hook or crook, he would obtain what he was pleased to call, his 'rights.'

"Some time later, when the _Grampus_ was ready for sea, I shipped my crew and tried the boat out, up and down the Delaware. The trials resulted in a few changes to the machinery, and when the submarine was finally in shape, I made her ready for the trip to the Bahamas. The day we were to start, I read a column or more about the Hawk, and what you lads were doing here in Atlantic City. I have always been interested in air ships quite as much as in submarines, so I decided to come to Atlantic City and have a look at the Hawk before going to the Bahamas.

"At that time, I know positively that Jurgens was in this resort, making moving pictures for a firm in Chicago. Some one in his service must have telegraphed him of my change of plan, thus enabling him to lay his schemes to capture the _Grampus_. I tried to keep my movements as secret as possible, but it is certain that they leaked out.

"On leaving the _Grampus_ to visit the beach, this afternoon, three trusty men were in charge of the submarine. The officer on duty at the Inlet wharf says that three men came there and claimed to have a letter from me to the man in charge of the _Grampus_; that the letter was opened by Cassidy, the machinist in charge of the boat, and that the men were admitted below decks. That, undoubtedly, is when the capture took place.

"As I said before, it is my belief that Jurgens either hoped to find the chart concealed in the _Grampus_, or else to capture me on my return from the beach and take the chart by force. Events worked the scheme out differently, and the chart was snatched from my hands while I was going over the papers I had taken from my pocket. Now, the chart is gone, and the _Grampus_ is gone."

Townsend relapsed into silence, his keen eyes leveled on Motor Matt's face.

The faces of Matt and Ferral, at that moment, were a study. It was a strange story they had heard, but that it was a true story they did not for a moment doubt.

"How much are you making, here in Atlantic City?" Townsend asked abruptly.

Matt told him, wondering what that had to do with the matter.

"You understand," Townsend went on, "that my interest is wholly in the _Grampus_. I must recover the boat. It is a fair surmise that Jurgens, and those with him, will lay a course for that particular island in the Bahamas. I have that chart, and all the other information contained in it, as clearly in my mind as though the paper itself was before my eyes. Furthermore, I questioned you so thoroughly about the Hawk, while we were in the air this afternoon, that I know the air ship's capabilities. In less than two weeks, Motor Matt, we could make a round trip to the Bahamas in your air ship. What I want is to charter the Hawk for two weeks, and to pay you five thousand dollars for the use of the craft. I am rich enough to do this, and my hope is that we will be able to recover the _Grampus_. If you boys will agree, I will pay over twenty-five hundred dollars before we start from Atlantic City and give you the remainder of the five thousand upon our return."

The two chums were thunderstruck. They had not had the least idea of the way Townsend's talk was trending.

"Sink me!" mumbled Ferral, "but that sounds like a large order."

"Not so large, perhaps," returned Townsend, "as it seems at first sight."

"How long a trip is it?" asked Matt, a bit dazed.

"Perhaps a thousand miles, as the crow flies, or fifteen hundred as we'll have to go. We could follow down the coast line, and then jump across the Florida Straits to the Bahamas. You tell me you can make thirty miles an hour in the Hawk, and that you can do even better with favoring winds. Say, at a rough estimate, that we make seven hundred miles a day. Why, inside of three days we should be where we want to go in the Bahamas. If we spend three or four days there, and as much time getting back, ten days ought to see the trip completed."

"But if we strike rough weather?" asked Matt.

"This is the time of year when the weather ought to be at its best. Nevertheless, if a stormy day comes, we could alight and wait for the weather to clear. Even at that, we ought to be back in Atlantic City in two weeks."

"It's a good deal of a guess, Mr. Townsend, as to whether, even if we do find the _Grampus_ in the Bahamas, you will be able to get her back."

"I am staking five thousand on the guess," said Townsend, quietly. "You're the right sort of a fellow to make such a venture a success, Motor Matt, and the proposition I have made you I wouldn't make to every one. What do you say?"

Matt and Dick withdrew for a little talk. They would lose their "advance bookings" for flights in the Hawk, but they stood to make a greater profit by this air cruise to the Bahamas than they could possibly hope for in Atlantic City.

"When do you want to start?" Matt asked.

"We should start in the morning," replied Townsend, "as early as possible."

"We'll go," said Matt.

"Good!" cried Townsend, a gleam of satisfaction darting through his eyes.

Taking a checkbook and a fountain pen from his pocket, he drew a chair up to the table and wrote for a few moments.

"There's your twenty-five hundred," said he, handing the check to Matt. "I've made out the check to King & Ferral. I'll leave you boys to do the outfitting, and will meet you on the beach, ready for the start, at seven in the morning. Good night."

With that, Townsend shook hands with Matt and Dick and went away. Dick, highly delighted, started in to do a sailor's hornpipe.

"Twenty-five hundred," he gloried, "and twenty-five hundred more to come. Strike me lucky, mate, but we're going to be millionaires if this keeps up."

"We've got to earn the money yet, Dick," returned Matt, "and that cruise to the Bahamas will be anything but a picnic."