"No! I don't believe you'll see us again in a hurry," Tom replied, as the power launch darted away, "unless we come back on board the 'Victor!'"
From the yacht's rail came a subdued cheer. Halstead waved his hand to his first mate.
A few bucketfuls of water slopped over into the tender. The sea was running high for such a small craft. Those in the launch, however, thought of nothing but the goal ahead.
Joe Dawson, at the wheel of the power tender, bent grimly over the compass.
There was little need for him to look about him, anyway, since it was not possible to see anything distinctly at a greater distance than three boat-lengths away.
Almost immediately the "Panther" dropped back out of view. The big motor yacht was now to go along only at her slow cruising speed, but the launch was to make greater haste.
Tom Halstead had taken his post well up in the bow of the rolling little craft. He was listening intently for any betraying sounds ahead in their course.
"This is hardly a big enough boat for a sea like this," grumbled Mr. Jephson, who had taken up his post close to the young captain.
"The sea _is_ a good deal on the roll to-day," Halstead assented, briefly.
"Why, this little craft acts as though she'd turn over and dump us all in the ocean," muttered the assistant district attorney, uneasily.
"The crowd we have aboard makes her sit lower than usual in the water," Tom explained.
"Is there any _real_ danger of our tipping over, Captain?" insisted Mr. Jephson.
"Do you think it is _going_ to happen?" demanded Mr. Jephson, anxiously.
There are many men, brave enough elsewhere, who are cowards on a heavy sea with only a small boat between themselves and the water. Back on the "Panther" the district attorney's representative had felt no sense of danger.
"Why, I don't know whether the boat is going to heel over, or not," Tom replied. "You are right in supposing that it isn't quite a large enough craft for the job in hand, but it was the only thing we had."
"I can't swim, but I'll try to keep my nerve," grimaced Mr. Jephson.
Whatever the others thought of their chances of being pitched into the ocean, none of them said anything.
Halstead looked back, presently, to inquire:
"Mr. Prentiss, can't you deaden the noise of our exhaust still more?"