Page:The Secret of the Caves.djvu/134

Frank declared. "His naval terms were certainly mixed. He called his ship a destroyer and a warship and a schooner and didn't seem to notice the difference. And he said the quartermaster was in charge after he left the ship."

"And everybody knows they don't make people walk the plank nowadays."

"His stories were as full of holes as a sieve. But I don't know whether he told them just for the fun of stuffing us or just because he is clean crazy and doesn't know any better."

The boys discussed Captain Royal and his eccentric behavior all the way back to their cave, and agreed that if the old gentleman was not a lunatic he was at least slightly unbalanced.

"The very fact that he lives away off here all by himself proves it," insisted Joe. "No man in his right mind would live in a cave down in this lonely spot. I wonder if he was the man who came and stole our supplies last night."

Frank shook his head.

"I thought of that and I took a look around his cave, but there was no sign of any of our stuff. Besides, he seemed much surprised when we told him there was some one else hanging around."

"He might have been smart enough to act