of the bag of gold, "and we'll get aboard."

"What you goin' to do about Motor Matt?" queried Clackett as he picked up the luggage.

"He's aboard the Santa Maria, and I am convinced that, for some cause or other, he's there through some underhand work of Sixty's. Our orders call on us to follow the Santa Maria and keep watch of Sixty. By doing that, we shall also be trailing Motor Matt and his friends. Something is bound to happen that will give us a little light on this."

Fifteen minutes later the Grampus was hustling down the river, her screw racing under the terrific impulse of the gasolene motor, and a white line of foam surging across her low deck and breaking against the base of the conning tower.

CHAPTER II.

MIXED MESSAGES.

"I tell you somet'ing," said Carl Pretzel gloomily, "I don'd like hanging aroundt mitoudt any pitzness. Id geds on my nerfs, yah, so helup me. For six tays, now, ve haf peen loafing in New Orleans, und eferyt'ing vas so keviet as some Quaker meedings. Nodding habbens. Vy don'd ve hear from Downsent mit a hurry-oop call to ged busy, eh?"

It was nine o'clock in the evening of the day preceding that on which the Grampus had got away in the wake of the Santa Maria, and Motor Matt, Dick and Carl were lounging in the small office of the Snug Harbor.

For two or three days Carl had been restless. He had visited all the five-cent shows on Canal Street, he had made a sight-seeing tour through the French Quarter, he had gone out to Lake Pontchartrain, and he had done various other things to pass away the time and make some excuse for his idleness, but his energetic spirit was not to be muzzled.

"Take it easy, old ship," said Dick; "I'm as anxious as you are to trip anchor and slant away for some port where we can do things, but there's a notion rattling around in my locker that it won't be long now before we run afoul of something real exciting. We were to wait a week on Townsend, and the week will be up to-morrow. We'll hear from him then, and I'll bank on it."

"So will I," spoke up Matt. "Don't be so impatient, Carl. Adventures are all right, but there are a few other things in life for fellows like us to think about."

"T'anks, brofessor," answered Carl, humbly. "Vat else vould you t'ink aboudt oof you vanted to be among der life vones?"

"An academy, for instance," said Matt with a far-away look in his gray eyes, "and a spell of grubbing at the stores of knowledge preparatory to a college course."

"Helup!" gasped Carl; "bolice! Matt is t'inking oof cutting himseluf oudt oof our herd, Tick, und going to school. Shpeaking for meinseluf, ven I go to school I don'd go, for I play vat you call hookey undt look for atvendures. All has got to go mit shnap und chincher for me, und vere iss lifeliness in pooks? Ach, donnervetter!"

"Avast, there, matey!" said Dick. "Matt is right. Adventures are all well enough in their place, but a cruise in the waters of learning is a main fine thing—for those who can afford it. Some day Matt will be in an academy, and some other day he will be in Harvard or Yale, and the King of the Motor Boys will be done with the buzz-engines for always."

Matt pulled himself together and laughed softly.

"Never, as long as I live," he declared, "will I be done with gasolene motors. Don't fool yourself on that for a minute. I may——"

"A message for you, Motor Matt. Just came off the wires."

A messenger boy pushed in among the three chums and handed a yellow envelope to Matt. All the messenger boys, together with nearly every one else in New Orleans, knew Motor Matt at least by sight. His work with the air ship, Hawk, which had recently been wrecked and destroyed, had kept him and his friends prominently in the public eye for some time.

"Sign the book, Dick," said Matt, tearing open the envelope.

"Vat you t'ink oof dot?" breathed Carl in a spasm of joyful excitement as the messenger boy went away. "Ve talk oof vanting t'ings to habben, und righdt off dey pegin. Ach, vat a luck! How easy id iss to be jeerful—somedimes!"

"Mayhap that message isn't anything to be cheerful about, Carl," said Dick. "I'll bet some one is asking to buy the Hawk, and her poor old bones are rusting in a live oak, down by Bayou Yamousa."

"Dot ain'd my guess, you bed you," palpitated Carl. "I t'ink id iss somepody asking vill ve go by der Spanish Main und hunt for birate shtuff. Vat a habbiness oof id iss!"

"You're both wrong," said Matt, a perplexed look on his face. "There has been some mistake in the telegraph office, and this message isn't for me."

"Not for you, mate?" queried Dick, picking the envelope off Matt's knee. "It's addressed plain enough—'Motor Matt, Care Snug Harbor Hotel, New Orleans.'"

"There's a different name inside," returned Matt.

"Vat id iss?" asked Carl, curiosity in a measure drawing the sting of disappointment.

"'Captain James Sixty,'" read off Matt, "'Snug Harbor Hotel, New Orleans, Louisiana.' The address is the same, but the name is different."

"Meppy der message iss for you, anyvay," persisted Carl. "Read him ofer und meppy you can dell."

"No, the message is part of the puzzle. Listen: 'In latitude twenty-eight degrees thirty minutes and twenty seconds north, longitude ninety-two degrees fourteen minutes and thirty-four seconds west two days ago. No wind and no drift since.' How could that possibly be for us, pards?"

"Id's some conuntrums, und dot's all aboudt id," grumbled Carl dejectedly. "Nodding habbens mit us more as you findt on a Suntay-school bicnic, und I'm going to ped mit meinseluf und hope for pedder t'ings in der morning. Good nighdt, bards."

With that Carl got up disgustedly and left the hotel office.

"How do you account for that, mate?" asked Dick.

"The messages got into the wrong envelopes," answered Matt. "Mr. James Sixty must be staying in this hotel. He's got my message and I've got his. That means we've got to find each other and exchange. Come on, Dick. We'll go over and talk with the clerk."

When they got to the desk they found a hulk of a man with a very red face talking with the night man in the office. The red-faced man seemed very much put out about something. He had a voice like a fog horn, and he was using it with a good deal of power. As Matt and Dick approached the desk the clerk suddenly put out his hand and stopped the flow of language.

"There's Motor Matt now," said he. "Here, Matt!" he called. "Have you got a telegram that don't belong to you? There's been a mix-up in messages, somehow, for Captain Sixty, here, has got one you ought to have. He was just asking me where you could be found."

"I was just coming to ask you about Captain Sixty," said Matt, holding out the message.

Sixty turned and snatched the message away.

"D'you read it?" he roared.

"Couldn't very well help it, captain," answered Matt. "If you'll look at the envelope you'll see it's addressed to me."

"I like some people's nerve," scowled the captain. "Here's your'n."

He flung a crumpled yellow sheet at Matt.

"It looks as though you'd read this," said Matt, "so I guess we're no more than even."

An angry gurgle came from Sixty's bull-like throat.

"I'll raise Cain if I find out this mix-up was done a-purpose," he growled.

"I don't see what anybody could want to do such a thing as that for," returned Matt.

The captain flung about and gave Matt an insolent up-and-down stare.

"Oh, you don't, huh?" he muttered. "Well, mebby it's well you don't."

The captain rolled away.

"The way to talk with him," said Dick resentfully, "is with a belaying pin. He looks like an old shellback, and I'll bet he's a bucko. But what's the message, mate?"

"A man in Boston wants to buy the