The day became rather sultry, and Frank remarked, after they had eaten a little cold lunch, that he would not be much surprised if they ran into a storm before a great while.
“Just what I was thinking,” Will added. “Do you know, I’m getting to be quite an old salt by now, and can just feel the weather in my bones. And for some time I’ve had an aching toe; that means rain, mark that, fellows.”
“I saw you taking a snapshot of our friend, Luther, on the sly this morning,” remarked Frank. “When you develop that, print me a copy, Will. You know I always like to study faces, and somehow his seemed to me to be a particularly strong one.”
“All the same he hasn’t made a success of his life, if what he told us is true,” Jerry put in, “for it was a hard luck story all through.” “Frank’s seen something he wants to examine closer,” Bluff suggested later on; “for he dived into the cabin, in a hurry; and here he comes out again with the field glasses.”
They all watched Frank adjust the binoculars to his range of vision, and sweep a half circuit around the river, finally focussing upon some object up-stream that must have caught his attention.
“I thought so,” he remarked presently; “here, take a look, Bluff, and say what you see.”
The other eagerly seized upon the glasses and had hardly leveled them than he uttered an exclamation.
“You’re right, Frank, it’s that _Lounger_, as sure as shooting!” he cried.
“She’s coming down the river like a bird, with her engine working again,” Bluff went on to say; “so they must have got the broken part mended, or a new piece sent on from St. Paul.”
“I’m afraid our troubles are going to begin again,” sighed Will; “and I was just saying this very morning what a jolly good and restful time we were having.”
“Say, they’re whooping it up at a great rate, all right!” ejaculated Jerry, when he had a chance to look; “either he’s in a big hurry, or else he wants to carry out some scheme to hurt us, if he can—perhaps run us down!”
“Let him try that, if he dares!” growled Bluff, staring hard at the now rapidly approaching power houseboat, bearing down upon them under the combined influence of a gasolene engine and the current.
“Would he try that sort of risky business, Frank, do you think?” asked Will. “It seems to me he’d take big chances of getting his own boat injured.”