Hardly willing to believe his ears lest the strain of disappointment should be too much for him in case the captain proved to be mistaken, Nat followed the direction of the excited mariner's pointing hand.
It was only by a severe effort of control that Nat saved himself from a collapse as he saw that it was not a case of a shipwrecked man's optical delusions.
Coming toward them from the eastern horizon was a craft of some sort. But she was, as yet, too far off to be made out as anything but a moving object. As she grew closer, however, it could be seen that she was without sails or funnel, and quite a small craft to be so far out at sea.
Nat, taking all this in with burning eyes, was struck at the same time by something strangely familiar about the craft. As she came on, doubt deepened into certainty. In a voice that shook under his effort to render it steady, Nat gave an amazed shout:
"The 'Nomad,' by all that's wonderful!"
"But will she see us?" This thought came on the top of his first glad recognition of the approaching craft. It was evident now that her course would bring the "Nomad"—or the vessel that Nat was sure he had recognized as her—past the castaways at some distance from them. They had no means of signaling and could not attract the attention of those on board. If, by any chance, she should go by without seeing them, Nat believed he should go mad. But to his joy as he and the captain in their half-sunken boat waved as hard as they dared, without disturbing the equilibrium of their craft, there came a puff of smoke and a sharp report from the bridge of the motor boat, where three figures could be seen.
It was a signal that they had been seen!
The "Nomad's" course was changed and she began to cut through the water directly for them, although of the surprise in store for them none of those on board Nat's craft was aware.
"Hoch der Kaiser, Nat!" shouted Captain Nelsen, in tremendous excitement. "Vee are safed, my poy! Vee are safed!"
"Donnerblitzen!" he exclaimed the next instant, for Nat, after breaking into a queer, trembly sort of smile and attempting to say something, had pitched forward, face down, in the water. For the first and last time in his life the overwrought boy had fainted.
Captain Nelsen reached forward his bulky form to pick Nat up, but as he did so, in the stress of the moment, he quite forgot the treacherous footing beneath him. His sudden movement caused the boat to lurch and in an instant he and Nat were struggling in the water—or rather it was the captain who was struggling, holding in his arms the inert form of the unconscious boy.
But luckily help was right at hand.
"Catch a line!" came a voice from above, as the "Nomad" swept down on the two in the water.
At the same instant a rope with a running noose in it snaked through the air, thrown by Joe Hartley, at whose side was Ding-dong Bell, while Cal was close beside them. It was Joe, whose trick at the wheel it was, who had first sighted the drifting, submerged boat. How the Motor Rangers came to be in that part of the Pacific will be explained before long.
Captain Nelsen deftly caught the rope as Joe rang the engine room bell for "stop-reverse."
The captain was, of course, a total stranger to the boys and to Cal, and who the bedraggled boy might be whom he held in his arms they had no idea. All at once, however, as the captain adjusted the line about the boy's body, Nat's face was visible.
"It's Nat Trevor!" shrieked Ding-dong Bell, his hesitating English, as usual, leaving him under the stress of the moment.
"So it is. Great heavens, what can he be doing here!" gasped Joe, his face a study in amazement and delight if ever there was one.
"Thank God, we've found him, lads," said Cal, reverently removing his sombrero, which he still insisted on wearing, even on board the "Nomad."
In less time than it takes to tell it both the captain and Nat were on board the gallant little motor craft, while an amazed ship's company gathered about them, all trying to talk at once. Captain Akers, who, after battling with the storm the night before, had been taking a nap below, was aroused by the hub-bub, and came on deck, and so did Sam Hinckley, who had been at the engines. So engrossed was everybody that the "Nomad," with her engines still reversed, was allowed to drift backward at her own sweet will.
The extraordinary recovery of the boy they believed to be either drowned, or in the hands of their relentless foes, temporarily deprived all hands of the power to do anything except exchange thunderstruck looks and exclamations.
Captain Akers lost no time, after the first stunning shock of amazement had passed, in getting some restoratives from the medicine chest in the cabin. In the meantime, Sam Hinckley had recollected his duty and, diving swiftly below to his engines, had checked their retrograde movement. Therefore, till new sailing orders came, the "Nomad" lay motionless on the long swells, while they all clustered about Nat on the bridge.
As for Captain Nelsen, his rugged constitution speedily rallied from the ordeal through which he and the lad had passed, and thanks to the influence of Captain Akers' remedies it was not long before Nat, too, was sitting up alert and in full possession of his faculties.
Then came his story. With what enrapt attention it was heard may be better imagined by each reader than set down in cold type. The extraordinary tale thrilled them as had few happenings in their adventurous lives.
At length, after such numerous interruptions as you may imagine, Nat concluded his strange tale. Then came the question of what to do. Clearly the schooner was bound for some island in the Marquesas Group—but just what spot of land was a question.
The only clew lay in Hicks's reference to the island of "Oh-dear-me." It was Captain Nelsen who solved the difficulty.
"Dot 'oh dear me' can be no odder island dan Odahmi," he said. "I know the place veil."
"What sort of a place is it?" asked Nat.
"Vell idt iss vun off der more remote islands of der group, undt ven I vos dere many years ago in a valer der vos nobody liffing on idt budt some natives."
"Then it is just the sort of place that Morello and his band would seek out," declared Joe. "They could lie snugly hid there for as long as they liked and emerge into the world at some distant date in comparative safety."
"Yes, if it wasn't for one thing," put in Captain Akers. "And that is that we happen to know their destination and can inform the authorities of it."
"That's so," agreed Nat, "but in the meantime you haven't yet told us how you came to happen along so opportunely."
"That is easily told, Nat, and after your narrative will seem very tame," rejoined Joe. "It appears, then, that while Sam was asleep on board, those rascals, knowing that the 'Nomad' was a menace to them, cut her cable and set her adrift on the outgoing tide. When Sam awoke he was miles down the coast. He lost no time in navigating back, much mystified in the meantime as to what could have happened to set him adrift. Of course, as soon as he had met us and we all compared notes and examined the cut end of the cable, it was as clear as day. With the 'Nomad' once more in our possession, we decided to set out at once in search of you, hoping that by hook or crook when the schooner struck the boat you had managed to save yourself. By good luck, after weathering that terrific gale last night, we ran across you this morning, but it was a close shave I can tell you, for you formed so inconspicuous an object on the ocean that we came near missing you."
"Ach himmel!" exclaimed Captain Nelsen.
"And now," said Nat, with a smile, "as I see that Sam Hinckley has secured the boat to the 'Nomad' with a line, I will ask him to pull her in alongside. I've got something on board there that will interest you all."
Nat had purposely thus held back the news of the recovery of the treasure chest so as to give his companions a real surprise.
"Wh-h-h-h-hat can it be?" wondered Ding-dong.
"You'll soon see," said Nat, with a smile. "Now then," as Sam Hinckley drew the half-sunken boat alongside, "just oblige me by looking down into that boat and telling me what you see under the middle seat."
He paused with twinkling eyes and the air of a conjurer. The others eagerly enough lined up at the bridge rail and peered down overside. The interior of the boat was visible, as if seen through glass in the translucent water.
"Well?" said Nat smilingly, after a moment.
Joe drew a long breath.
"It—it—looks like the sapphire chest," he gasped. "Oh, Nat!"
The others merely looked their astonishment. In a few rapid words Nat supplied that part of the narrative of their escape dealing with the recovery of the chest, and which he had up to that moment purposely omitted.
"And now, boys," he concluded, "let's get a line over and hoist her on board. I, for one, am dying to feast my eyes on the sapphires once more and gloat over the way we've fooled those scoundrels of Morello's."
Sam Hinckley slipped over the side and soon made fast a turn around the box. How many pairs of willing hands hauled that box on board I leave you to imagine.
At last, dripping with water, there it stood on the bridge. They gathered about it half awesomely. There was something in its eventful history that gave pause to their somewhat noisy merriment. Silently they stood about, gazing with burning eyes while Nat fitted the key which he still carried. The lock was a simple one of old-fashioned make, and opened easily.
The young Motor Ranger swung back the lid with a gesture.
There, spread out over its precious contents was the same bit of canvas that they had placed there before the treasure chest had been filched. Nat's pulses beat a bit faster as he raised one corner of the canvas and prepared to disclose once more to their view the wonderful contents that lay beneath.
He raised it with a sweeping gesture and an exclamation of triumph which changed midway to a shout of dismay.
The box contained no precious sapphire hoard!
In place of the gem-bearing rocks, which they had expected to meet their gaze, the group on the bridge stared into a box filled with old bits of iron ballast, ropes ends, damaged blocks, and other bits of marine odds and ends.
Colonel Morello had tricked them.
In the place of the blazing sapphires, the box held nothing but so much worthless old junk!