Come on, Flying Fish! Come on!" shouted Rob, as the hydroplane crept
ever nearer and nearer to his boat's stern.

Rob noticed, as he swung a trifle wide of the stake raft, that it
seemed to be the intention of Jack Curtiss, who was at the wheel, to
swing the hydroplane round the sharp angle of the course inside of the
Flying Fish. Guessing that this would mean disaster to her ill-advised
occupants, he waved his hand at them to keep out.

"When we need your advice we'll send for it. This is the time we've
got you!" yelled Jack Curtiss, bending low over his wheel, as he grazed
by the Flying Fish's stern to take the inside course.

At the same instant, so quickly that the boys did not even get a mental
picture of it, the hydroplane overturned.

Taking the curve at such a speed and at such a sharp angle had, as Jack
had surmised, proved too much for her stability. Her occupants were
pitched struggling into the water.

"Shall we pick them up?" yelled Merritt.

"No," shouted Rob; "they've all got life belts on. A launch from the
club will get them."

Indeed, as he spoke a launch was seen putting off to the rescue. The
accident had been witnessed from the club, and as the water was warm,
the boys were satisfied that no harm would come to the three from their
immersion.

But the delay almost proved fatal to the Flying Fish's chance of
winning. Close behind her now came creeping up the speedy Albacore.

But a few hundred feet before the finish the Flying Fish darted ahead
once more, and shook off her opponent amid a great roar of yells and
whoops and cheers. An instant later she shot across the line--a winner.

"Bang!" went the gun, in token that the race was finished.

"I congratulate you," said Commodore Wingate, as the boys brought their
craft up to the float. "It was a well-fought race."

And now came the captains of the Albacore, Snark and Bonita.

"You won the race fairly and squarely," said the former, shaking Rob's
hand. "I presume, commodore, the time was taken?"

"It has been," replied that official. "The Flying Fish wins by one
minute and four and seven hundredths seconds."

More cheers greeted this announcement, mingled with laughter and some
sympathy, as the club launch, towing the capsized hydroplane, puffed up
to the float. From the launch emerged three crestfallen figures with
dripping garments. But wet as he was, Jack Curtiss was not going to
surrender the race without a protest.

"