“By the way, captain,” put in Tom, “have you noticed a stranger watching the Dora the last night or two?”

At this question Captain Starr leaped to his feet, allowing his corncob pipe to fall to the ground.

“What made you ask that question?” he demanded.

“We have an enemy, named Dan Baxter.  We suspect he is following us and is spying on us.”

“Yes, I have seen a young fellow around half a dozen times.  In fact, I caught him on the houseboat once.”

“You did!” cried Dick.  “What was he doing?”

“Going through the stuff in the living room.”

“What did you do to him?”

“I yelled at him, demanding to know what he wanted.  As soon as he heard me he ran ashore and disappeared.”

“Did you try to find him?”

“No, because I didn’t want to leave the houseboat alone.”

“Did you see him last night—­while our colored man was here?”

“I saw somebody, but it was too dark to make out exactly who it was.”

CHAPTER XVIII

ON BOARD THE HOUSEBOAT

After questioning Captain Starr as closely as possible all three of the Rover boys came to the conclusion that it must have been Dan Baxter who had visited the Dora on the sly.

“I don’t like this at all,” said Sam.  “He is going to make trouble for us—­no two ways about that.”

“The best thing to do, in my opinion, is to get away without delay,” said Tom.  “He won’t find it so easy to follow us then.”

“I’m going to throw him off the scent,” said Dick.

“How?”

“By pretending to go to one place, while we can really go to another.”

“That’s a scheme.”

A small tug had been chartered to tow the houseboat, and the captain of this was ordered to be ready for moving at eleven o’clock.

“We shall go to Camdale first,” said Dick, naming a place about forty miles away.

“All right, sir—­wherever you say,” said the tug commander.

Returning to the hotel, the boys found the others finishing breakfast and sat down to their own.  They said the Dora was in perfect trim and that the trip down the Ohio was to begin without delay.

“Well, I am sure I am ready,” said Nellie.  “I am just dying to see the houseboat.”

Aleck hurried around to buy the necessary stores, which were taken to the Dora in a wagon, Then two carriages brought down the ladies and the boys and a truck brought along the baggage.

“What a beautiful boat!” cried Dora after going on board.  “And how tidy everything is!”

“Then you are not ashamed to have her called the Dora?” said Dick, well satisfied.

“Ashamed?  Oh, Dick, I am delighted!”

“This boat is a gem,” was Songbird Powell’s comment.  “Say, folks on the Ohio will take us, to be millionaires.”