"The ship most certainly foundered," declared the captain. "The next morning bits of wreckage were found by these two survivors."
"Then all are lost?" half-sobbed Belle.
"I fear so, Senorita," was the answer of the captain, "unless some few reached islands in small boats."
"Is there a chance of that?" asked Jack.
"A slight chance, yes, Senor."
"Then it"s a chance I"m going to take!" cried Jack.
"What do you mean?" asked his sister, wonderingly.
"I mean that we can go in search!" Jack went on, eagerly. "It"s worth trying, isn"t it, Walter?"
"I should say so--yes, by all means! But what sort of a craft can we get to cruise in?"
"I just heard of one!" said Jack, eagerly. "The Tartar. She"s a big motor boat, and will be just the thing for us. I"m going to see about it right away. Who"s with me for a cruise in the Tartar?"
"I am!" came from Cora.
"We"re not going to be left behind," said Bess.
"Count on me, of course," spoke Walter, quietly.
"And, Senor Jack--may--may I go?" faltered Inez.
"Of course!"
"Senor--Senor Jack," she spoke in a tremulous whisper. "If you are successful--if you find ze lost ones, and we are near Sea Horse Island, would you leave me zere--wiz my father?"
"Leave you there?" cried Jack. "We"ll bring your father away from there, if we get the chance! Now come on! We have lots to do!"
CHAPTER XVI
SENOR RAMO MISSING
Jack"s eyes glowed with the brightness of renewed health, and determination, as he looked at his sister, at Bess and Belle, and at Walter. It was like old times, when the motor girls had proposed some novel or daring plan, and the boys had fallen in with it. This time it had been Jack"s privilege to make the suggestion, and the others were only too ready to agree.
"Oh, Jack, do you think we can do it?" asked Cora.
"Of course we can!" her brother cried, with a growing, instead of lessening, enthusiasm. "We"ll just have to do something, and I can"t think of anything better to do--can you? than going off in search of the folks."
"We simply must find them--if they"re alive," spoke Bess, rather solemnly.
"We"ll find them--alive!" predicted Walter, joining his cheerful efforts to those of his college chum.
"Oh, you Americans--you are so wonderful, so amazing!" whispered Inez. "I am so glad I am wiz you," and she divided her affectionate looks impartially between Jack and his sister.
"What do you think of it, Captain?" asked Walter of the skipper of the steamship. "Is it possible to go about down among these islands in a big motor boat?"
"Yes, if the boat be large enough, and seaworthy."
"I"m thinking of the Tartar," said Jack. "I heard of her from the engineer of the boat we came out in just now."
"Oh, the Tartar. Yes, she is a very fine boat, and quite safe, except in a very bad storm."
"Oh!" gasped Bess.
"But you are not likely to have bad blows now," the captain went on, "especially after this one we"ve just pa.s.sed through. It is the last of the hurricane season, I hope. In fact, this was most unusual.
Yes, I should say it would be very safe to make a cruise in the Tartar. I know the craft well."
"And what are the chances of success?" asked Walter in a low voice of the commander, as Jack, with his sister and the Robinson twins withdrew a little apart to discuss the important question of the coming cruise.
Captain Ponchero shrugged his shoulders in truly foreign fashion.
"One cannot tell, Senor," he said in a low voice. "Certainly it is a dubious tale the sailors told--a tale of mutiny and shipwreck. But the sea is a strange place. Many unforeseen things happen on it and in it. I have seen shipwrecked ones come back from almost certain death, and again--"
He hesitated.
"Well?" asked Walter, a bit impatiently. "Might as well hear the worst with the best."
"And again," resumed the captain, "I have seen what would appear to be the safest voyage result in terrible tragedy. So one who knows much of the sea, hesitates to speak with certainty about it. I should say, Senor, that the chance was worth taking."
"Then we may find some of them alive?"
"You may, and again--you may not. But it is worth trying. If you will come below with me, I will give you the exact longitude and lat.i.tude where we picked up the two sailors in the open boat. Then you can put for there, and make it the starting point of your search."
"Good idea," commented Walter.
By this time Jack and the others had finished their little discussion, and were eager to further question the captain concerning all the details he could give about the foundering of the Ramona.
But there was little else that could be told.
The sailors had given all the information they possessed. They repeated again how the ship had suddenly run into a storm, and how the refusal of the captain to put into a port, hard to navigate in a storm, brought on the mutiny.
"But did they see any of our folks--either Mr. and Mrs. Robinson, or Mrs. Kimball?" asked Jack, while his sister and the twins hung breathless on the answer.
The sailors had not especially noticed any pa.s.sengers. They had been in hard enough straits themselves, not having joined the mutineers.
"But they are certain the ship foundered? asked Cora.
"There seems to be little doubt of it, Senorita," said the captain.
"It was a fearful storm. We had three boats carried away, as well as part of our port rail."