"What's the idea?" asked the amazed ship captain, noting how Weddigen was reddening. "I guess Mr. Weddigen can speak for himself," was Jay's only answer, not wishing to create a scene right at the outset of the new adventure. "Well, that's rather extraordinary," began the captain. "Just a little unpleasantness that we had yesterday," added Jay, "But we'll forget it now for the good of the cause." "I hope things will be all right, for he is a very fine diver, according to my information, and can stand a lot with his big physique, so I am told," explained the captain. "The matter's a closed incident so far as I am concerned," offered Jay. And so the incident was closed, except for knowing glances exchanged among the newest additions to the ship's personnel. Soon the _Nemo_ had backed away from her moorings and was headed out into Long Island Sound, the most of the divers and those members of the crew not actually engaged in the ship's navigation standing out on deck in enjoyment of the balmy spring morning. "I guess you would not be averse to knowing something about this craft," began Captain Austin after a half hour's run. He had strolled forward to where Jay, Dick and Larry were watching the backwash of the water as the steel prow of the _Nemo_ sliced its way forward with knife-like precision. Indeed they would! The three veterans of the war, two of whom had quite a fund of submarine knowledge from their own experiences abroad, were wondering what the _Nemo_ was like. Was it possible that the submersible was a diving bell from which divers could make their exit while it lay on the ocean bed? Were trap doors opened and the pressure of sea water held in abeyance by dense volumes of compressed air? Or did divers go down from the deck of the submarine just as from any other craft? If so, why the submarine, with its narrow, cramped quarters, in preference to any other type of vessel? These were some of the questions flitting through their minds as they embarked on their first treasure-hunting voyage. The whole thing was soon to be unfolded by Captain Austin. "With this craft we do most of our locating," he began. "By that I mean that we are here equipped with special apparatus for finding the lost ships. Many a salvaging company has found that it is one thing to explore a sunken ship or even raise it, but quite another thing to actually locate the submerged ship. It is one thing to know the approximate position where a ship has been sunk, but another thing to know the exact spot. Some charts may give you the exact spot where a ship has foundered, but this spot may measure five miles or more, and if the ship is located in any channel or such parts of the ocean where there is an undertow or heavy undercurrents, the ship will soon be covered with sand, moss or barnacles, and hard for divers to locate."