“Sure enough, we ought to set a guard on this fellow,” agreed Harry.  “I’ll volunteer to go and ‘red up’ the cabin as the Dutchman says, and incidentally keep an eye on his royal joblots.”

The boy descended to the cabin and in furtherance of his design walked to a locker and extracted an automatic pistol which he placed in a convenient pocket.  He then busied himself about the place in small tasks that always kept him within sight of the rescued man.

No effort was made by the stranger to engage the boy in conversation, however, and he worked away undisturbed.  Occasionally the bulldog would enter and after sniffing suspiciously at the prostrate figure of the rescued man would emit a low growl of disapproval and retreat.  He was not disposed to be friendly.

On one of his trips to the forward cabin Harry noticed the clothes belonging to the newcomer lying on the floor where they had been dropped when he had been put into the berth.  Thinking to care for them by straightening and drying them, the boy picked up the first garment in the pile.  It was a vest and as he raised it a collection of small articles fell from the pocket to the floor.

Among the contents was a metal match box which fell and slid across the floor, striking, on the locker as it dropped.

“Well, that’s too bad.  The gentleman will have wet matches, I guess,” thought the boy.  “I’d better empty those wet ones out and give him some dry ones against his waking and needing some.”

What was his amazement, however, upon opening the box to find instead of matches, a clipping from a newspaper.  Harry was about to thrust it back into the box again when a printed word caught his attention and held him for a moment motionless.  The word was the name of their vessel, the “Fortuna.”

Hastily glancing through the headlines, Harry uttered a quick cry and dashed forward to the pilot house.

“Boys!  Jack, Tom, Arnold,” he cried excitedly.  “What do you think of this?  Here’s some more of this mystery for us.”

“What do you mean, mystery?” queried Tom, scoffingly.

“Just listen to this!  Here’s a newspaper clipping evidently from a Chicago paper which tells about our fitting out the Fortuna for the cruise to the Gulf of Mexico and also hazards the guess that we are young and adventurous spirits evidently seeking the buried treasure on the Gulf Coast.”

“Does it say that we are after the Spanish Treasure Chest at the old Fort on Biloxi Bay, that must be dug up in the full of the moon on a rising tide with not a word said?” asked Tom.

“It does say that our destination is Biloxi and that we are known to be daring lads,” replied Harry.  “But that is not all.”

“Let’s have it, Harry,” cried Jack.  “I’m anxious to hear all.”

“There’s a pencil notation across the paper that says:  ’Get these fellows at any cost.’  That’s mighty encouraging.”