



Produced by Anthony Matonac








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. "I guess he wasn't
expecting you."

"Oh, well, I shouldn't have been so alarmed, only I was thinking deeply
about a certain change I am going to make in the submarine, Tom. I was
day-dreaming, I think, when your ship whizzed through the air. But tell
me, did you find everything all right at Shopton? No signs of any of
those scoundrels of the Happy Harry gang having been around?" and Mr.
Swift looked anxiously at his son.

"Not a sign, dad," replied Tom quickly. "Everything was all right. We
brought the things you wanted. They're in the airship. Oh, but it was a
fine trip. I'd like to take another right out to sea."

"Not now, Tom," said his father. "I want you to help me.  And I need
Mr. Sharp's help, too. Get the things out of the car, and we'll go to
the shop."

"First I think we'd better put the airship away," advised Mr. Sharp. "I
don't just like the looks of the weather, and, besides, if we leave the
ship exposed we'll be sure to have a crowd around sooner or later, and
we don't want that."

"No, indeed," remarked the aged inventor hastily. "I don't want people
prying around the submarine shed. By all means put the airship away,
and then come into the shop."

In spite of its great size the aeroplane was easily wheeled along by
Tom and Mr. Sharp, for the gas in the container made it so buoyant that
it barely touched the earth. A little more of the powerful vapor and
the Red Cloud would have risen by itself. In a few minutes the
wonderful craft, of which my readers have been told in detail in a
previous volume, was safely housed in a large tent, which was securely
fastened.

Mr. Sharp and Tom, carrying some bundles which they had taken from the
car, or cabin, of the craft, went toward a large shed, which adjoined
the house that Mr. Swift had hired for the season at the seashore. They
found the lad's father standing before a great shape, which loomed up
dimly in the semi-darkness of the building. It was like an immense
cylinder, pointed at either end, and here and there were openings,
covered with thick glass, like immense, bulging eyes. From the number
of tools and machinery all about the place, and from the appearance of
the great cylinder itself, it was easy to see that it was only partly
completed.

"Well, how goes it, dad?" asked the youth, as he deposited his bundle
on a bench. "Do you think you can make it work?"

"I think so, Tom. The positive and negative plates are giving me
considerable trouble, though. But I guess we can solve the problem. Did
you bring me the galvanometer?"

"Yes, and all the other things," and the young inventor proceeded to
take the articles from the bundles he carried.

Mr. Swift looked them over carefully, while Tom walked about examining
the submarine, for such was the queer craft that was contained in the
shed.  He noted that some progress had been made on it since he had
left the seacoast several days before to make a trip to Shopton, in New
York State, where the Swift home was located, after some tools and
apparatus that his father wanted to obtain from his workshop there.

"You and Mr. Jackson have put on several new plates," observed the lad
after a pause.

"Yes," admitted his father. "Garret and I weren't idle, were we,
Garret?" and he nodded to the aged engineer, who had been in his employ
for many years.

"No; and I guess we'll soon have her in the water, Tom, now that you
and Mr. Sharp are here to help us," replied Garret Jackson.

"We ought to have Mr. Damon here to bless the submarine and his liver
and collar buttons a few times," put in Mr. Sharp, who brought in
another bundle. He referred to an eccentric individual who had recently
made an airship voyage with himself and Tom, Mr. Damon's peculiarity
being to use continually such expressions as: "Bless my soul! Bless my
liver!"

"Well, I'll be glad when we can make a trial trip," went on Tom. "I've
traveled pretty fast on land with my motorcycle, and we certainly have
hummed through the air. Now I want to see how it feels to scoot along
under water."

"Well, if everything goes well we'll be in position to make a trial
trip inside of a month," remarked the aged inventor. "Look here, Mr.
Sharp, I made a change in the steering gear, which I'd like you and Tom
to consider."

The three walked around to the rear of the odd-looking structure, if an
object shaped like a cigar can be said to have a front and rear, and
the inventor, his son, and the aeronaut were soon deep in a discussion
of the technicalities connected with under-water navigation.

A little later they went into the house, in response to a summons from
the supper bell, vigorously rung by Mrs. Baggert. She was not fond of
waiting with meals, and even the most serious problem of mechanics was,
in her estimation, as nothing compared with having the soup get cold,
or the possibility of not having the meat done to a turn.

The meal was interspersed with remarks about the recent airship flight
of Tom and Mr. Sharp, and discussions about the new submarine. This
talk went on even after the table was cleared off and the three had
adjourned to the sitting-room. There Mr. Swift brought out pencil and
paper, and soon he and Mr. Sharp were engrossed in calculating the
pressure per square inch of sea water at a depth of three miles.

"Do you intend to go as deep as that?" asked Tom, looking up from a
paper he was reading.

"Possibly," replied his father; and his son resumed his perusal of the
sheet.

"Now," went on the inventor to the aeronaut, "I have another plan. In
addition to the positive and negative plates which will form our motive
power, I am going to install forward and aft propellers, to use in case
of accident."

"I say, dad! Did you see this?" suddenly exclaimed Tom, getting up from
his chair, and holding his finger on a certain place in the page of the
paper.

"Did I see what?" asked Mr. Swift.

"Why, this account of the sinking of the treasure ship."

"Treasure ship? No. Where?"

"Listen," went on Tom. "I'll read it: 'Further advices from Montevideo,
Uruguay, South America, state that all hope has been given up of
recovering the steamship Boldero, which foundered and went down off
that coast in the recent gale.  Not only has all hope been abandoned of
raising the vessel, but it is feared that no part of the three hundred
thousand dollars in gold bullion which she carried will ever be
recovered. Expert divers who were taken to the scene of the wreck state
that the depth of water, and the many currents existing there, due to a
submerged shoal, preclude any possibility of getting at the hull. The
bullion, it is believed, was to have been used to further the interests
of a certain revolutionary faction, but it seems likely that they will
have to look elsewhere for the sinews of war.  Besides the bullion the
ship also carried several cases of rifles, it is stated, and other
valuable cargo. The crew and what few passengers the Boldero carried
were, contrary to the first reports, all saved by taking to the boats.
It appears that some of the ship's plates were sprung by the stress in
which she labored in a storm, and she filled and sank gradually.'
There! what do you think of that, dad?" cried Tom as he finished.

"What do I think of it? Why, I think it's too bad for the
revolutionists, Tom, of course."

"No; I mean about the treasure being still on board the ship. What
about that?"

"Well, it's likely to stay there, if the divers can't get at it. Now,
Mr. Sharp, about the propellers--"

"Wait, dad!" cried Tom earnestly.

"Why, Tom, what's the matter?" asked Mr. Swift in some surprise.

"How soon before we can finish our submarine?" went on Tom, not
answering the question.

"About a month. Why?"

"Why? Dad, why can't we have a try for that treasure? It ought to be
comparatively easy to find that sunken ship off the coast of Uruguay.
In our submarine we can get close up to it, and in the new diving suits
you invented we can get at that gold bullion. Three hundred thousand
dollars! Think of it, dad! Three hundred thousand dollars! We could
easily claim all of it, since the owners have abandoned it, but we
would be satisfied with half. Let's hurry up, finish the submarine, and
have a try for it."

"But, Tom, you forget that I am to enter my new ship in the trials for
the prize offered by the United States Government."

"How much is the prize if you win it?" asked Tom.

"Fifty thousand dollars."

"Well, here's a chance to make three times that much at least, and
maybe more. Dad, let the Government prize go, and try for the treasure.
Will you?"

Tom looked eagerly at his father, his eyes shining with anticipation.
Mr. Swift was not a quick thinker, but the idea his son had proposed
made an impression on him. He reached out his hand for the paper in
which the young inventor had seen the account of the sunken treasure.
Slowly he read it through. Then he passed it to Mr. Sharp.

"What do you think of it?" he asked of the aeronaut.

"There's a possibility," remarked the balloonist "We might try for it.
We can easily go three miles down, and it doesn't lie as deeply as
that, if this account is true. Yes, we might try for it. But we'd have
to omit the Government contests."

"Will you, dad?" asked Tom again.

Mr. Swift considered a moment longer.

"Yes, Tom, I will," he finally decided. "Going after the treasure will
be likely to afford us a better test of the submarine than would any
Government tests. We'll try to locate the sunken Boldero."

"Hurrah!" cried the lad, taking the paper from Mr. Sharp and waving it
in the air. "That's the stuff!  Now for a search for the submarine
treasure!"




Chapter Two

Finishing the Submarine


"What's the matter?" cried Mrs. Baggert, the housekeeper, hurrying in
from the kitchen, where she was washing the dishes. "Have you seen some
of those scoundrels who robbed you, Mr. Swift? If you have, the police
down here ought to--"

"No, it's nothing like that," explained Mr. Swift. "Tom has merely
discovered in the paper an account of a sunken treasure ship, and he
wants us to go after it, down under the ocean."

"Oh, dear! Some more of Captain Kidd's hidden hoard, I suppose?"
ventured the housekeeper. "Don't you bother with it, Mr. Swift. I had a
cousin once, and he got set in the notion that he knew where that
pirate's treasure was. He spent all the money he had and all he could
borrow digging for it, and he never found a penny. Don't waste your
time on such foolishness. It's bad enough to be building airships and
submarines without going after treasure."  Mrs. Baggert spoke with the
freedom of an old friend rather than a hired housekeeper, but she had
been in the family ever since Tom's mother died, when he was a baby,
and she had many privileges.

"Oh, this isn't any of Kidd's treasure," Tom assured her.  "If we get
it, Mrs. Baggert, I'll buy you a diamond ring."

"Humph!" she exclaimed, as Tom began to hug her in boyish fashion. "I
guess I'll have to buy all the diamond rings I want, if I have to
depend on your treasure for them," and she went back to the kitchen.

"Well," went on Mr. Swift after a pause, "if we are going into the
treasure-hunting business, Tom, we'll have to get right to work. In the
first place, we must find out more about this ship, and just where it
was sunk."

"I can do that part," said Mr. Sharp. "I know some sea captains, and
they can put me on the track of locating the exact spot. In fact, it
might not be a bad idea to take an expert navigator with us. I can
manage in the air all right, but I confess that working out a location
under water is beyond me."

"Yes, an old sea captain wouldn't be a bad idea, by any means,"
conceded Mr. Swift. "Well, if you'll attend to that detail, Mr. Sharp,
Tom, Mr. Jackson and I will finish the submarine. Most of the work is
done, however, and it only remains to install the engine and motors.
Now, in regard to the negative and positive electric plates, I'd like
your opinion, Tom."

For Tom Swift was an inventor, second in ability only to his father,
and his advice was often sought by his parent on matters of electrical
construction, for the lad had made a specialty of that branch of
science.

While father and son were deep in a discussion of the apparatus of the
submarine, there will be an opportunity to make the reader a little
better acquainted with them. Those of you who have read the previous
volumes of this series do not need to be told who Tom Swift is. Others,
however, may be glad to have a proper introduction to him.

Tom Swift lived with his father, Barton Swift, in the village of
Shopton, New York. The Swift home was on the outskirts of the town, and
the large house was surrounded by a number of machine shops, in which
father and son, aided by Garret Jackson, the engineer, did their
experimental and constructive work. Their house was not far from Lake
Carlopa, a fairly large body of water, on which Tom often speeded his
motor-boat.

In the first volume of this series, entitled "Tom Swift and His
Motor-Cycle," it was told how he became acquainted with Mr. Wakefield
Damon, who suffered an accident while riding one of the speedy
machines. The accident disgusted Mr. Damon with motor-cycles, and Tom
secured it for a low price. He had many adventures on it, chief among
which was being knocked senseless and robbed of a valuable patent model
belonging to his father, which he was taking to Albany. The attack was
committed by a gang known as the Happy Harry gang, who were acting at
the instigation of a syndicate of rich men, who wanted to secure
control of a certain patent turbine engine which Mr. Swift had invented.

Tom set out in pursuit of the thieves, after recovering from their
attack, and had a strenuous time before he located them.

In the second volume, entitled "Tom Swift and His Motor-Boat," there
was related our hero's adventures in a fine craft which was recovered
from the thieves and sold at auction. There was a mystery connected
with the boat, and for a long time Tom could not solve it. He was
aided, however, by his chum, Ned Newton, who worked in the Shopton
Bank, and also by Mr. Damon and Eradicate Sampson, an aged 
whitewasher, who formed quite an attachment for Tom.

In his motor-boat Tom had more than one race with Andy Foger, a rich
lad of Shopton, who was a sort of bully. He had red hair and squinty
eyes, and was as mean in character as he was in looks. He and his
cronies, Sam Snedecker and Pete Bailey, made trouble for Tom, chiefly
because Tom managed to beat Andy twice in boat races.

It was while in his motor-boat, Arrow, that Tom formed the acquaintance
of John Sharp, a veteran balloonist. While coming down Lake Carlopa on
the way to the Swift home, which had been entered by thieves, Tom, his
father and Ned Newton, saw a balloon on fire over the lake. Hanging
from a trapeze on it was Mr. Sharp, who had made an ascension from a
fair ground. By hard work on the part of Tom and his friends the
aeronaut was saved, and took up his residence with the Swifts.

His advent was most auspicious, for Tom and his father were then
engaged in perfecting an airship, and Mr. Sharp was able to lend them
his skill, so that the craft was soon constructed.

In the third volume, called "Tom Swift and His Airship," there was set
down the doings of the young inventor, Mr. Sharp and Mr. Damon on a
trip above the clouds. They undertook it merely for pleasure, but they
encountered considerable danger, before they completed it, for they
nearly fell into a blazing forest once, and were later fired at by a
crowd of excited people. This last act was to effect their capture, for
they were taken for a gang of bank robbers, and this was due directly
to Andy Foger.

The morning after Tom and his friends started on their trip in the air,
the Shopton Bank was found to have been looted of seventy-five thousand
dollars. Andy Foger at once told the police that Tom Swift had taken
the money, and when asked how he knew this, he said he had seen Tom
hanging around the bank the night before the vault was burst open, and
that the young inventor had some burglar tools in his possession.
Warrants were at once sworn out for Tom and Mr. Damon, who was also
accused of being one of the robbers, and a reward of five thousand
dollars was offered.

Tom, Mr. Damon and Mr. Sharp sailed on, all unaware of this, and unable
to account for being fired upon, until they accidentally read in the
paper an account of their supposed misdeeds. They lost no time in
starting back home, and on the way got on the track of the real bank
robbers, who were members of the Happy Harry gang.

How the robbers were captured in an exciting raid, how Tom recovered
most of the stolen money, and how he gave Andy Foger a deserved
thrashing for giving a false clue was told of, and there was an account
of a race in which the Red Cloud (as the airship was called) took part,
as well as details of how Tom and his friends secured the reward, which
Andy Foger hoped to collect.

Those of you who care to know how the Red Cloud was constructed, and
how she behaved in the air, even during accidents and when struck by
lightning, may learn by reading the third volume, for the airship was
one of the most successful ever constructed.

When the craft was finished, and the navigators were ready to start on
their first long trip, Mr. Swift was asked to go with them. He
declined, but would not tell why, until Tom, pressing him for an
answer, learned that his father was planning a submarine boat, which he
hoped to enter in some trials for Government prizes. Mr. Swift remained
at home to work on this submarine, while his son and Mr. Sharp were
sailing above the clouds.

On their return, however, and after the bank mystery had been cleared
up, Tom and Mr. Sharp, aided Mr. Swift in completing the submarine,
until, when the present story opens, it needed but little additional
work to make the craft ready for the water.

Of course it had to be built near the sea, as it would have been
impossible to transport it overland from Shopton.  So, before the keel
was laid, Mr. Swift rented a large cottage at a seaside place on the
New Jersey coast and there, after erecting a large shed, the work on
the Advance, as the under-water ship was called, was begun.

It was soon to be launched in a large creek that extended in from the
ocean and had plenty of water at high tide. Tom and Mr. Sharp made
several trips back and forth from Shopton in their airship, to see that
all was safe at home and occasionally to get needed tools and supplies
from the shops, for not all the apparatus could be moved from Shopton
to the coast.

It was when returning from one of these trips that Tom brought with him
the paper containing an account of the wreck of the Boldero and the
sinking of the treasure she carried.

Until late that night the three fortune-hunters discussed various
matters.

"We'll hurry work on the ship," said Mr. Swift at length.  "Tom, I
wonder if your friend, Mr. Damon, would care to try how it seems under
water? He stood the air trip fairly well."

"I'll write and ask him," answered the lad. "I'm sure he'll go."

Securing, a few days later, the assistance of two mechanics, whom he
knew he could trust, for as yet the construction of the Advance was a
secret, Mr. Swift prepared to rush work on the submarine, and for the
next three weeks there were busy times in the shed next to the seaside
cottage. So busy, in fact, were Tom and Mr. Sharp, that they only found
opportunity for one trip in the airship, and that was to get some
supplies from the shops at home.

"Well," remarked Mr. Swift one night, at the close of a hard day's
work, "another week will see our craft completed.  Then we will put it
in the water and see how it floats, and whether it submerges as I hope
it does. But come on, Tom. I want to lock up. I'm very tired to-night."

"All right, dad," answered the young inventor coming from the darkened
rear of the shop. "I just want to--"

He paused suddenly, and appeared to be listening. Then he moved softly
back to where he had come from.

"What's