he fellow leaped over the side, holding something in his hand.

"There they go! Catch them!" yelled Mr. Damon.

"Let them go!" answered the lad as the men ran toward the wood. "I
want my boat. I'm afraid they've damaged her. One of them tore
something from the bow."

At the same instant the two companions of the fellow who had paused in
the forward part of the ARROW saw that he had something in his hand.
With yells of rage they dashed at him, but he, shaking his fist at
them, plunged into the bushes and could be heard breaking his way
through, while his companions were in pursuit.

"They've quarreled among themselves," commented Mr. Damon as high and
angry voices could be heard from the woods. "There's some mystery
here, Tom."

"I don't doubt it, but my first concern is for my boat. I want to see
if they have damaged her."

Tom had run so closely in shore with the RED STREAK that he had to
reverse to avoid damaging the craft against the bank. In a mass of
foam he stopped her in time, and then springing ashore, he hurried to
his motor-boat.

CHAPTER XIX

A QUIET CRUISE

"Have they done any damage?" asked Mr. Damon as he stood in the bow of
the RED STREAK.

Tom did not answer for a moment. His trained eye was looking over the
engine.

"They yanked out the high tension wire instead of stopping the motor
with the switch," he answered at length, and then, when he had taken a
look into the compartment where the gasoline tank was, he added: "And
they've ripped out two more of the braces I put in. Why in the world
they did that I can't imagine."

"That's evidently what one man had that the others wanted," was Mr.
Damon's opinion.

"Probably," agreed Tom. "But what could he or they want with wooden
braces?"

That was a puzzler for Mr. Damon, but he answered:

"Perhaps they wanted to damage your boat and those two men were mad
because the other got ahead of them."

"Taking out the braces wouldn't do much damage. I can easily put
others in. All it would do would be to cause the tank to sag down and
maybe cause a leak in the pipe. But that would be a queer thing to do.
No, I think there's some mystery that I haven't gotten to the bottom of
yet. But I'm going to."

"Good!" exclaimed Mr. Damon. "I'll help you. But can you run your
boat back home?"

"Not without fixing it a bit. I must brace up that tank and put in a
new high-tension wire from the spark coil. I can do it here, but I'