Tom Swift and His Submarine Boat | Page 3

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ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END*
TOM SWIFT AND HIS SUBMARINE BOAT or Under the Ocean for
Sunken Treasure
by VICTOR APPLETON
CONTENTS I News of a Treasure Wreck II Finishing the Submarine
III Mr. Berg Is Astonished IV Tom Is Imprisoned V Mr. Berg Is
Suspicious VI Turning the Tables VII Mr. Damon Will Go VIII
Another Treasure Expedition IX Captain Weston's Advent X Trial of
the Submarine XI On the Ocean Bed XII For a Breath of Air XIII Off
for the Treasure XIV In the Diving Suits XV At the Tropical Island
XVI "We'll Race You For It!" XVII The Race XVIII The Electric Gun
XIX Captured XX Doomed to Death XXI The Escape XXII At the
Wreck XXIII Attacked by Sharks XXIV Ramming the Wreck XXV
Home with the Gold

TOM SWIFT AND HIS SUBMARINE BOAT

Chapter One
News of a Treasure Wreck
There was a rushing, whizzing, throbbing noise in the air. A great body,
like that of some immense bird, sailed along, casting a grotesque
shadow on the ground below. An elderly man, who Was seated on the
porch of a large house, started to his feet in alarm.
"Gracious goodness! What was that, Mrs. Baggert?" he called to a
motherly-looking woman who stood in the doorway. "What
happened?"
"Nothing much, Mr. Swift," was the calm reply "I think that was Tom
and Mr. Sharp in their airship, that's all. I didn't see it, but the noise
sounded like that of the Red Cloud."
"Of course! To be sure!" exclaimed Mr. Barton Swift, the well-known
inventor, as he started down the path in order to get a good view of the
air, unobstructed by the trees. "Yes, there they are," he added. "That's
the airship, but I didn't expect them back so soon. They must have
made good time from Shopton. I wonder if anything can be the matter
that they hurried so?"
He gazed aloft toward where a queerly-shaped machine was circling
about nearly five hundred feet in the air, for the craft, after Swooping
down close to the house, had ascended and was now hovering just
above the line of breakers that marked the New Jersey seacoast, where
Mr. Swift had taken up a temporary residence.
"Don't begin worrying, Mr. Swift," advised Mrs. Baggert, the
housekeeper. "You've got too much to do, if you get that new boat done,
to worry."

"That's so. I must not worry. But I wish Tom and Mr. Sharp would land,
for I want to talk to them."
As if the occupants of the airship had heard the words of the aged
inventor, they headed their craft toward earth. The combined aeroplane
and dirigible balloon, a most wonderful traveler of the air, swung
around, and then, with the deflection rudders slanted downward, came
on with a rush. When near the landing place, just at the side of the
house, the motor was stopped, and the gas, with a hissing noise, rushed
into the red aluminum container. This immediately made the ship more
buoyant and it landed almost as gently as a feather.
No sooner had the wheels which formed the lower part of the craft
touched the ground than there leaped from the cabin of the Red Cloud a
young man.
"Well, dad!" he exclaimed. "Here we are again, safe and sound. Made a
record, too. Touched ninety miles an hour at times--didn't we, Mr.
Sharp?"
"That's what," agreed a tall, thin, dark-complexioned man, who
followed Tom Swift more leisurely in his exit from the cabin. Mr.
Sharp, a veteran aeronaut, stopped to fasten guy ropes from the airship
to strong stakes driven into the ground.
"And we'd have done better, only we struck a hard wind against us
about two miles up in the air, which delayed us," went on Tom. "Did
you hear us coming, dad?"
"Yes, and it startled him," put in Mrs. Baggert.