“Are you the captain?”

“No, the captain is ashore,” was the short answer.

“I’ll come aboard,” said Dick, and without waiting for another word from the man he made his way to the deck, followed by Tom.  He had already directed Sam to remain in the motor-boat with John Slater, to summon assistance if necessary.

“What do you want here?” demanded the burly man, surlily.

“I guess you know well enough,” answered Dick, shortly.  “Where is that man who is a prisoner?”

“You mean the crazy man?”

“He isn’t crazy, and you know it.”

“Those men who had him in charge said he was crazy,” grumbled the burly individual.

“Where is he?”

“What is that to you?”

“Everything.  That man is my father, and they have kidnapped him.  Maybe you know that kidnapping is a State’s prison offense,” added the oldest Rover boy, sharply.

“Humph!  I ain’t had nothing to do with any kidnapping, young fellow,” growled the man.  “I’m the mate o’ this schooner, that’s all.  If anything is wrong, you’ll have to see the captain about it.”

“You say he went ashore?”

“Yes.”

“Did those men and my father go with him?”

“All of ’em went, yes.”

“Who was left here besides you?”

“Those two dago sailors, that’s all,” and the mate pointed to two men who lay on the forward deck, asleep.

“Are you willing to have me take a look around?” went on Dick, after a pause.

“You’ll have to wait till the captain gets back,” answered the man, doggedly.  “If there is anything wrong I don’t want to be mixed up in it.”

“If you want to keep out of trouble you’ll help us all you can,” put in Tom.  “This is a serious business.”

“I don’t know a thing about it,” and the man shrugged his shoulders.

Without another word Dick walked across the deck and descended into the cabin.  The burly man’s face clouded and he made a move as if to follow him.

“You stay here,” said Tom, and put his hand in his hip pocket, as if about to draw some weapon.

The man changed color and shifted uneasily.

“All right, have your own way,” he said.  He was a coward at heart, and as he had not been in the plot against Anderson Rover he did not wish to get any deeper into the trouble.

It did not take Dick long to convince himself that his father was not on board the schooner.  He called his parent’s name, and then passed swiftly through the cabin and several staterooms and also a cook’s galley.  He saw where somebody had been locked in one of the staterooms, for the compartment was in disorder and the door was marred and cracked.

“Dad must have struggled to get away,” he murmured.  “I hope they didn’t hurt him.”

When Dick came on deck he found Tom guarding the burly man.  The two sailors were still asleep—­ or pretended to be.