His friends laughed, knowing how Chet hated to be left out of anything.
'Too late,' Joe told him. 'We're heading for Shantytown to take another look-see.'
By now the speedy craft was far out on the broad bay. The water had grown choppy and was
turning from green to steely gray. In the distance the boys watched a cluster of white sails
skimming before the breeze.
'A race,' Biff observed.
'Hey! Look out!' Frank cried sharply.
A black hull, parting the water in white sheets at its prow, was bearing straight down on the
Sleuth's rear on the portside.
Frank shouted and waved frantically at the oncoming boat. 'Cut her, Joe!'
Still the strange craft roared along toward the boys. At the last moment it came about,
throwing a heavy bank of water aboard the Sleuth. For a moment the two boats sped forward,
gunwale to gunwale. The name Black Cat was on the prow of the strange boat.
'Not so close!' Frank shouted angrily. The pilot ignored the warning. He was a swarthy man with black hair combed straight back. At his side sat a huge man with a bald head.
Calling on the Sleuth's reserve of power, Joe shot the craft forward, veering to the right. The boys looked back with satisfaction as the black boat dropped behind.
Facing forward again, Joe caught his breath in horror. Directly ahead loomed the great white
sails of the racers, bearing down on them swiftly. He cut the wheel frantically to the left. 'Hang on!' he yelled.
'We're going to hit!'
CHAPTER II
An Evening of Mystery
INSTANTLY Frank grabbed the steering wheel held by his brother. He twisted it violently and
pulled out the throttle at the same time.
For a moment the Sleuth banked hard and balanced on her side, while the huge tilting sails
hovered overhead!
One-two-three-four-dark sailboat hulls sliced safely across the speedboat's boiling wake as she shot outward into the bay.
'Wow! That last one only missed us by a foot!' Biff exclaimed.
'Oh, boy, let's not do that again!' Chet said shakily.
'You okay, Joe?' Frank asked as he slid back to his side of the boat.
'Yes, thanks to you! Where did the Black Cat go?'
'There she is!' Biff shouted.
Looking around, the brothers saw that the other speedboat had veered in plenty of time to run
easily before the sail craft. The big, bald man was pointing to the boys and laughing.
'Bank her again, Joe!' Frank cried angrily. 'We're going after those men!'
'I can't!' Joe shouted back over the roar of the engine. 'She won't respond to the wheel.'
Already a quarter of a mile of open water separated the two boats. Helpless, the four friends
watched
the black craft race away.
Meanwhile, the Sleuth shot ahead at full speed, her handsome prow lifted clear of the water.
'Do something!' Chet cried. 'We'll run aground!'
'No, we won't,' said Frank, who had noticed the curving white swath of their wake. 'We're going in circles.'
The Sleuth, her steering mechanism disabled by Frank's emergency turn, was clearly completing
a wide circuit.
'We might as well save gas,' Joe said, throttling down. 'One thing's sure. We won't make Shantytown today.'
Glumly the four sat still while the distant shores seemed to rotate around them. To the east,
where the bay opened toward the sea, a grayish mist lay over the black water.
'Look at that fogbank,' Biff said. 'I hope we're not stuck here when it rolls in. It would be mighty hard for anybody to find us.'
'I don't think that pea soup will move in before dark,' Frank said, but there was a note of concern in his voice.
'We're supposed to go to Callie's costume party tonight,' Chet reminded the others, 'so we'd better get out of this mess soon!'
Suddenly the boys' attention was diverted by the high whine of a motorboat plowing toward
them across the water.
'More trouble?' Chet muttered.
'Trouble, nothing!' Joe exclaimed. 'It's the Napoli! Hi,Tony!'
The four companions waved wildly at their friend and in a few minutes a yellow speedboat
idled up alongside the Sleuth.
'Thought it was you,' said dark-haired Tony Prito from behind the wheel.
'Why are you fellows running in circles?' asked Jerry Gilroy, who sat beside Tony.
'Our steering's fouled up,' Joe reported briefly. 'Give us a tow, will you, Tony? I'll tell you about it on the way in. Chet, let's have that line back there!'
Taking a coil of rope from the stout boy, Joe scrambled onto the prow of the Sleuth. He secured the line at the bow, passed it to Jerry in the Napoli, and then climbed into Tony's boat himself.
While the Sleuth bobbed along toward Bayport in the wake of the Napoli, Joe told the
newcomers of the near collision.
Twenty minutes later the six friends stood together on the dock of the Bayport boatyard while
a mechanic examined the Sleuth.
'You think the fellow tried to sideswipe you on purpose?' Tony Prito asked.
'Yes, I do,' Frank said. 'They saw us clearly and heard us shouting, but they came straight at us, anyhow.'
'Maybe something went wrong with their boat,' Tony suggested. 'It could have been an accident.'
'Accident!' Chet Morton snorted. 'You should have seen the look on the bald man's face after we skinned past that last sailboat. They were out to get us all right.'
'But why?' Jerry inquired. 'Did you ever see them before?'
'Never!' Joe stated positively. 'But I certainly hope we see them again!'
'We'll report this to the Coast Guard,' Frank said. 'They may want to talk to those two men.'
Just then the young mechanic joined the group. 'You have a damaged rudder,' he reported to the Hardys. 'I've fixed it temporarily, but you'll need a new part to do the job right. It'll take a day or two for me to get it. Bring your boat back then.'
'I'll follow while you take the Sleuth to your boathouse,' Tony volunteered. 'Then we can all go to the Coast Guard station in the Napoli.'
After the Hardys' craft -had been safely moored in their boathouse, Tony headed the Napoli out into the bay. He turned and followed the shoreline to the long jetties where the freighters were docked.
Soon the Napoli passed under the gray bow of a big cutter moored at the Coast Guard pier.
Tony made his boat fast, and the six boys climbed up a steel ladder onto the dock. They entered the small, neat station office, which had a short-wave tower on its roof.
The officer on duty rose from his desk. 'Hello, Frank-Joe-fellows,' he greeted them. The personnel at the Bayport station knew the Hardys well. More than once they had cooperated
with the boys and their father on cases.
'Hello, Lieutenant Parker,' Frank said gravely. 'We want to report a near collision caused by a powerboat named the Black Cat. Can you tell us who owns her?'
