The hay was almost in when Frank and Harry stood one evening close under the apex of the roof in the log barn. The crop was heavy and because the barn was small it had been their business during the afternoon to spread and trample down the grass Jake flung up to them. They had been working at high pressure at one task or another since soon after daylight that morning, and now the confined space was very hot, though the sun was low. Its slanting rays smote the cedar shingles above their bent heads, and the dust that rose from the grass floated about them in a cloud and clung to their dripping faces. Frank felt that the veins on his forehead were swollen when they paused a moment for breath, leaning on their forks.
"I suppose we could get a couple more loads in, and there can't be more than that," said Harry dubiously. "I wouldn't mind a great deal if the next jumperful upset."
Frank devoutly wished it would, for he felt that he must get out into the open air, but a few moments later they heard the plodding oxen's feet and the groaning of the clumsy sled. The sounds ceased abruptly and Jake's voice reached them.
"Tramp it down good!" he called. "You've got to squeeze in this lot and another."
Frank choked down the answer which rose to his lips. But the hay must be got in, and the boys fell with their forks upon the first of the crackling grass Jake flung up to them. There seemed to be more dust in it than usual,and before the jumper was half unloaded they were panting heavily. When at last the oxen hauled the sled away they stood doubled up knee-deep in the hay with their backs close against the roof.
"I can't see how we're to make room for the last lot," Harry gasped. "Still, I guess it has to be done."
They set to work again, packing the hay into corners and stamping it down, and his occupation reminded Frank of what he had heard about mining in a thin seam of coal. It seemed hotter than ever, the dust was choking, and at every incautious move he bumped his head or shoulders against the beams. The last sled arrived before they were ready for it, and they crawled about half buried, dragging the grass here and there with their hands and ramming it with their feet and knees into any odd spaces left. At length the work was finished, and wriggling toward the opening in the wall, Harry caught at the edge of it and finding a foothold on a log beneath boldly leaped down. Frank was, however, less fortunate when he followed his companion, for some of the hay slipped away beneath him, and, without the least intention of leaving the barn in that undignified fashion, he suddenly shot out through the hole. He felt the air rush past him, and then, somewhat to his astonishment, found himself on the ground, none the worse except for the jar of the fall.
"If I'd tried to do that it's very likely I'd have broken my leg," he panted.
He sat down and threw off his hat. It was delightful to feel the breeze upon his dripping face and to be out in the fresh air again. He had been at work for fourteen hours, and was aching all over, but that did not trouble him. The hay was safely in, and there was some satisfaction in the feeling that he had done his part in a heavy piece of work. Looking about him he noticed that the shadow of the firs had crept half across the clearing, and that thin wisps of fleecy cloud were streaming by high above their tall black tops. Then he heard Harry speaking to his father.
"There's a smart southerly breeze, and the tide is running ebb," he was saying. "What's the matter with starting for Victoria right away?"
"Haven't you done enough for to-day?" Mr. Oliver asked with a smile.
"I don't feel as fresh as I did this morning," Harry admitted. "Anyway, when we've got a fair wind and three or four hours' ebb going with us, it would be a pity not to make the most of them."
Mr. Oliver looked doubtful. "I'm anxious to get away, because, as I've arranged to meet a man in Victoria, we'll have to take the steamer unless we can slip across very shortly. I've an idea that we may get more wind than we'll have any use for before sun-up. Still, we could run in behind the point at Bannington's, if it was necessary."
Then Jake broke in: "If you're going, I'll get supper and pack some bread and pork along to the sloop."
Mr. Oliver assented, and an hour later they paddled off to the sloop. The dog jumped into the canoe with them, and when they got on board he quietly sat down on the floorings while Jake helped the boys to hoist the mainsail. When they came to the jib Mr. Oliver stood up on the deck looking about him.
"I think we'd better have the smaller one," he advised.
They were ready at length, and Jake, who was to stay behind, called the dog as he was about to jump into the canoe. Harry was busy forward just then with the mooring chain in his hand and the loose jib thrashing about him, while the big mainboom jerked over Mr. Oliver's head as he sat at the helm. The dog, however, showed no signs of moving.
"Give him a shove," said Jake, addressing Frank. "When he gets up on deck, pitch him in."
Frank turned toward the dog, and then stopped abruptly when it showed its teeth and growled.
"It looks as if he meant to go along," Jake remarked with a grin. "Prod him with the boathook if he won't move."
Frank was dubious, as he imagined the dog might resent the prodding. At that moment Harry, who had been too busy to notice what was going on, hauled up the weather sheet of the jib.
"I'm clear," he called to his father. "I'll cant her head to lee when you're ready."
Mr. Oliver put the helm up as the bows swung around, and when the sloop slanted over Jake made a futile grab at the dog. Then shouting to Frank, he dropped into the canoe and clutched the rail as the sloop forged ahead, but the boy was busy with the mainsheet and did not look up. In another moment Jake let go. Almost immediately afterward the sloop came round, and when she stretched away toward the mouth of the cove the canoe dropped astern.
"Stand by your jibsheets," called Mr. Oliver. "We'll have to come round again."
They were very busy during the next few minutes, for the cove was narrow and the wind was blowing in. When at length they swept out into the open water the dog crawled up to Harry and licked his hands. Harry looked at his father, who made a little sign of assent.
"I suppose he'll have to stay," he sighed. "When that dog decides on doing anything it's wise to let him do it. Now we'll square off the mainboom."
They let the sheet run until the big mainsail swung right out, and the sloop drove away, rolling viciously. Short, foam-flecked seas came tumbling after her, but as the tide was running the same way under them, lessening the resistance, very few broke angrily. Frank had learned enough by this time, however, to realize thatit would probably be different when the stream turned. In the meanwhile the boat was sailing very fast, with a little ridge of frothing water washing by on either side when she lifted, and a thin shower of spray blowing all over her. Now and then the great sail with the heavy boom beneath it swung upward in an alarming fashion. Frank noticed that Mr. Oliver's eyes were gazing intently before him, and that his hands were clenched tightly upon the tiller.
"She seems rather bad to steer," he said.
"Yes," said Mr. Oliver, without looking up. "You have to be careful when you're running before a fresh breeze. It's remarkably easy to bring the mainsail over with a bang if you let her fall off too much, and the result of that would probably be to tear the mast out of her. It's considerably worse when there's a big sea coming along behind."
Frank glanced astern. The sun had gone and the sky was strewn with ranks of hurrying clouds, while the sea was flecked with smears of white.
"Aren't you pressing her a little?" Harry asked. "She'd be easier on the helm if we lowered the peak or tied a reef in."
"I'd like to pick up the Hootalquin reef before it's dark," answered Mr. Oliver. "I'm not sure we'll get very much farther to-night. You wanted a sail, and I fancy you're going to be gratified."
During the next hour Frank had to admit that this remark was warranted. The breeze steadily freshened, and there was no doubt that the sea was rising. It frothed in a white hillock on either side of the boat, and little trails of foam swirled about her deck. Frank could see that she was overburdened by the sail she was carrying, but Mr. Oliver still sat with a set face at the tiller and showed no desire to leave his post. In the meanwhile it was getting dark. Forest and beach had faded to a faint, shadowy blur and there was only asteadily narrowing stretch of foaming water in front of them. Frank was very wet and the spray beat upon him continually. At length, when the light had almost gone, a dusky patch of something grew out of the gathering gloom ahead, and fancying it to be a rocky point, he felt considerably relieved, because there would be shelter behind it. A minute or two later Mr. Oliver called to the boys.
"Get forward and ease the peak down," he ordered. "Then back the jib. We'll tie two reefs in."
"Aren't we going in here?" Harry asked.
His father shook his head. "No, it's too dark. I could take her through in the daylight, but there are one or two rocks in the channel. We'll have to try for Bannington's."
Frank felt a twinge of disappointment. Bannington's was still a good way off, and it seemed to him that the gale was increasing every moment. He scrambled forward with Harry, however, and when they loosened the rope the tall peak of the sail swung down. Soon after they had done this Mr. Oliver put down his helm, causing the mainboom to jerk and thrash to and fro furiously, while as the boat came up head to wind a white sea struck her side and foamed on board her.
"Handy with the throat!" shouted Mr. Oliver. "I don't want to leave the helm."
They slacked another rope, making the gaff sink farther down, after which they tied up about a yard of the inner bottom corner of the sail to the foot of the mast. This was comparatively easy, but it was different when, standing in the water on the lee deck, they grabbed the tackle beneath the boom and endeavored to pull the leach, or outer edge, of the mainsail down. It would not come, and the heavy spar struck them as it jerked in board, flinging Frank off into the well.
"Get another pull on your topping lift," ordered Mr. Oliver.
They jumped forward to do it, but it proved no easy task, for they had to raise the outer end of the heavy boom. They were struggling with the tackle again when Mr. Oliver laid both hands on the rope.
"Now," he shouted, "heave, and bowse her down!"
They succeeded this time, and afterward hung out over the water while they knotted the reef-points beneath the spar. Then when they had trimmed the jib over Mr. Oliver put up his helm and the sloop drove on again into the darkness with shortened sail.
The boys sat down as far under the side deck as they could get, out of the worst of the spray, with the dog crouching in the water which washed about the floorings at their feet.
"Why didn't your father help us more than he did?" Frank asked presently.
"He couldn't leave the tiller for more than a moment or two," said Harry. "When Jake and I reefed her the day we took you off the steamer there wasn't as much wind. Of course, there are boats in which you can lash the helm, but that's not always possible. If dad had let go the tiller she'd have fallen off and started sailing, which would have dragged the tackle from our hands or pitched us in, and then she'd have come up again banging and shaking. He kept her heading so that the mainsail was lifting slack with no weight in it."
Frank was commencing to realize that the handling of a sailboat was rather a fine art. It is as much of a machine as a steamer, but it is also of the kind whose efficiency depends directly upon the human eye, hand and brain. Man has evolved a number of such instruments, and in the right hands they are far more wonderful than the others. Any one, for instance, can learn the pianola, but to extract fine music from a Cremona violin is a very different matter.
It blew steadily harder, and there was, as Frank noticed, a difference in the sea, for the flood stream wasnow setting up against them and was growing shorter and more turbulent. There was a smaller interval between the waves, which seemed to become steeper and less regular. They curled over and broke about the boat with a sound that reacted unpleasantly upon Frank's nerves, and he was thankful that he could, after all, see very little of them. The sloop's motion also changed. One moment she seemed to be moving almost slowly, and the next she swung up in a quick, savage rush, with her bows in the air and the white foam boiling high about her. Sometimes, too, there was a thud and a splash astern, and the decks were swept by a deluge of seething water.
In the meanwhile the boys had contrived to light a lamp in a little box which held a compass, and they laid it on the thwart before Mr. Oliver, though, as he explained in a word or two, it was particularly difficult to steer an exact course in a sea of that kind. It was on the boat's quarter, that is, she was traveling with the wind almost behind her at a long slant across the course of the waves, but each time an extra big wave foamed up astern Mr. Oliver let her fall off and run right down wind with it to prevent its breaking on board.
Frank wondered how he did it, for the seas were following them and it was quite dark, but Mr. Oliver had no need to look around. He had for guides the sound of the oncoming seas, the pull of the tiller, and the motion of the boat, and, besides, from long experience his brain worked sub-consciously. He did not pause to consider when the bows climbed out and the stern sank down in a rush of foam, and had he done so, in all probability he would have brought the big mainboom smashing over. To run a fore-and-aft rigged craft, and a sloop in particular, before a badly breaking sea, is a difficult and somewhat perilous thing, and the ability to do it comes only from long acquaintance with the water, and, perhaps, from something in the helmsman's nature.
The boat sped on furiously, though they presently lowered the peak down to reduce the sail further, and by degrees Frank became conscious of an unpleasant nervous tension that seemed to sap away his hardihood. There was nothing to do in the meanwhile, but he felt that if he were called upon for any difficult or hazardous service he would find himself incapable of it. He was drenched and shivering, and he did not want to move. He only wished to cower beside Harry under the partial shelter of the coaming. This was, however, a feeling that other folks occasionally experience who go to sea in small vessels, which they have to grapple with and overcome. It is when there is no particular call on him, and he can only stand by and watch, that terror gets its strongest hold on the heart of a man.
At length Mr. Oliver called to the boys. "We must be close abreast of Bannington's," he said. "The end of the point should be to leeward. Get forward, Harry, where you can see out beneath the jib."
Frank followed his companion as he crawled up on the little deck. He did not want to seem afraid, but he held on tight with one hand when they knelt in the water that splashed about them. He could see the frothy seas beneath the black curve of the jib, but for what seemed a very long while there was nothing else. Then Harry suddenly raised his voice.
"Point's right ahead!" he sang out, and the next moment jumped to his feet. "There's a black patch a little to weather."
"Up peak for your lives!" cried Mr. Oliver.
He left the helm with a bound, and all three struggled desperately with a rope, while as the bagged mainsail extended and straightened out a sea broke on board the boat. Then they floundered aft and dragged in the mainsheet with all their might, after which Mr. Oliver jumped for the helm again, while the boys flattened in the jib.
"We're the wrong side of the point," gasped Harry. "I'm not sure she'll beat round it."
There was no difficulty in imagining what was likely to happen if she failed to do so, and Frank, who did not think she would last long if she washed up among the boulders before the sea that was running, clung to the coaming in a state of tense suspense. What seemed to be a continuous sheet of spray whirled about him, the boat slanted over at an alarming angle with half her lee deck in the sea, and the tops of the confused breaking waves through which she plunged washed all over her. This was sailing with a vengeance, and a very different thing from lounging at the tiller while she swung smoothly across the water before a fair wind. She was now thrashing to windward for her life, with the full weight of the sea on her weather bow and a foam-swept reef lying in wait close to lee of her, and whether she would claw off it or not depended largely upon her helmsman's skill.
Frank could see him dimly, a black shape gripping the tiller, and he was unpleasantly aware of the fact that there would speedily be an end of them all if he lost his nerve for a moment or made a blunder. It happens now and then at sea that the safety of crew and vessel hangs upon the brute strength of human muscle and the simple valor which enables a man to do what is required of him on the moment without flinching; empty assurance and a consequential air are of uncommonly little service then. Such occasions are a very grim test of manhood, and, as a rule, it is not the loud talker who best stands that strain.
Frank admitted afterward that he was badly scared, which was not in the least unnatural. It was more important that he should nevertheless realize that it was his business to trim the jib over when this was necessary. His companion, who was gazing to leeward, presently raised his voice.
"Broken water close ahead," he announced.
"Stand by your jib!" shouted Mr. Oliver. "We must try to heave her around."
Frank let the lee sheet run, groping deep in the water for it as Mr. Oliver put down the helm, and with a frantic thrashing of canvas the sloop came up into the wind. There was a moment of suspense during which she seemed to stop, and the boy felt his heart thumping furiously. He knew that if she fell off again on the previous tack nothing could save her from going ashore. Suddenly he heard Harry call to him.
"Haul it up!" he shouted. "We have to box her off."
Frank hauled with all his might, and the thrashing of the head sail ceased. It caught the wind, and a sea fell upon the boat as the bows swung around. Then they jumped to the opposite side of her and struggled desperately to haul the lee sheet in as she forged ahead again, after which there was nothing to do but wait and wonder if she was driving in toward the shore or working out toward open water. They stood on for half an hour, seeing nothing, and then came round half-swamped, only to stagger away on the opposite tack, running once more into horribly broken water. As they did so Harry shouted that there were boulders, the end of the point, he fancied, close to lee.
"She won't come about in the rabble," said Mr. Oliver.
It was evident that they must now either scrape around the point on that tack or go ashore, and Frank felt his nerves tingle as he gazed into the spray. He fancied that there was something black and solid beyond it, but could distinguish nothing further. Then the blackness faded, the sea seemed to become a little more regular, and Harry cried out hoarsely, "We're round!"
"Down peak!" called Mr. Oliver. "We'll have to jibe her."
Frank had learned that to jibe a boat is to turn her around stern to wind, instead of head-on, which is the usual way, and scrambling forward with Harry he helped lower the peak. After that they again floundered aft, leaving the mainsail reduced in size, and grabbed the sheet as Mr. Oliver put up his helm. The bows swung around as the boat went up with a sea, and the big boom tilted high up into the darkness above the boys. They struggled savagely with the sheet, which slightly restrained it, until the boat rolled suddenly down upon her side as the sail jerked over and the rope was torn swiftly through their hands. There was a crash and a bang, and Frank was conscious that the water was pouring over the coaming. He clung to the sheet, however, and while Mr. Oliver helped them with one hand they got a little of it in, after which the sloop, rising somewhat, drove forward. A few minutes later the sea suddenly became smoother, the wind seemed cut off, and Frank made out a black mass of rock rising close above them. They ran on beneath it until Mr. Oliver, rounding the boat up, bade them pitch the anchor over.
When the boat brought up to her anchor the boys spent some time straightening up her gear and pumping her out. The work put a little warmth into them, but they were glad to crawl into the cabin when it was done. There was scarcely room in it to sit upright, and with the moisture standing beaded everywhere it looked rather like the inside of a well. Mr. Oliver had lighted the stove and a lamp was burning. By and by he took off a hissing kettle, and when they had made a meal they lay down in their wet clothes amidst a raffle of more or less dripping ropes and sails. Fortunately, the place was warm, and Frank was thankful to stretch himself out along the side of the boat. He was discovering that mental strain of the kind he had undergone during the last few hours is as fatiguing as bodily labor.
But he did not immediately go to sleep. The craft rocked upon the long swell which worked in round the point, with now and then a sharp rattle as she plucked hard at her cable. Sometimes she swung suddenly around upon it as an eddying blast swept down from the rocks above, and the drumming of the halliards against the mast broke continuously through the moan of the wind among the trees ashore and the deeper rumble of the ground sea. At last, however, he fell into a heavy slumber, and it was daylight and Harry had put the spider on the stove when he awoke again. He made his breakfast before he went out on deck, to find that the wind had dropped a little and it was raining hard. The dim, slate-green water lapped noisily upon the wall of rock close by, and glancing seaward he saw nothing but a leaden haze and a short stretch of tumbling combers. Mr. Oliver had gone out earlier and was standing on the deck looking about him.
"There's no great weight in the wind, though the sea's still rather high," he said presently. "I think we can push on for Victoria."
Frank, who fancied they would not get there before that night, was by no means so keen about the sail as he had been on the previous day. He felt that it would be considerably pleasanter to remain in the shelter of the point until the sun came out or the wind went down, and it seemed to him that Harry shared his opinion. The dog also looked very draggled and miserable and had evidently had enough of the voyage. They, however, set the mainsail, leaving the reefs in, hauled up the anchor, and hoisted the jib as the sloop stretched out across the waste of tumbling water, after which the boys went below to straighten up the breakfast things. Frank once or twice felt a little sick as he did so, and he noticed that Harry wore a somewhat anxious look.
"It's not blowing as hard as it was when we ran in, but I don't think dad would have gone unless he'd some particular reason," Harry said at length. "I wonder who the man is he expects to meet in Victoria, because I'm inclined to believe it's not the one who wants him to look at the land. The worst of dad is that he keeps such a lot to himself."
They crawled out again shortly afterward and found the seas getting longer and bigger. Once or twice a blur of something went by that might have been the end of an island, and Mr. Oliver changed his course a little, but after that the dim, green water stretched away before them empty and only broken by smears of snowy froth, and the sloop drove on before the comberswhich came up out of the haze astern of her in long succession.
It was toward noon, and Mr. Oliver had gone into the cabin to get dinner ready, leaving Harry at the helm, when, glancing around, Frank saw an indistinct mass of something break out of the mist. It grew into the shadowy shape of a steamer while he watched it.
"There's a big vessel close by," he said, touching his companion's arm.
Harry glanced over his shoulder. "Sure," he nodded. "What's more, she's coming right along our track. Get in some mainsheet while I luff her."
He changed the sloop's course a trifle, but in the meanwhile the steamer was growing in size and distinctness with a marvelous rapidity. Her great bow seemed to be rising out of the water like a headland, over which Frank could just see the tiers of white deckhouses, one mast, and the tall smokestack. Then he glanced forward at the sloop's wet deck and the low strip of her double-reefed mainsail, looking very small among the tumbling seas, and it occurred to him that it would probably be difficult for the steamer's lookout to see them. He felt rather anxious when he glanced back astern.
"She still seems to be coming right down on us," he said.
Harry called his father, who hurried out and glanced at the vessel.
"Shall we get up and yell?" the boy asked.
"No," said Mr. Oliver curtly, "they couldn't hear you to windward. Let her come up farther."
Frank helped drag some more mainsheet and then looked around again with a very unpleasant thrill of apprehension. The black bow seemed almost above them, and the sea leaped against a wall of plates as the great mass of iron swung slowly out of it and sank down again. Then from somewhere beside the smokestack a streak of white steam blew out and a great reverberatory roar came hurtling about them. Mr. Oliver's anxious face relaxed.
"They've seen us," he said. "Her helm's going over."
The bow drew out and lengthened into an increasing strip of side. Another mast became visible, with a double row of white deckhouses and a tier of boats between. Here and there a cluster of diminutive figures showed up among them, and then the great ship sped by with the whole of her size revealed. The sloop plunged madly on her screw-torn wake, but in another minute or two she had drawn away and was melting into the haze again.
"A big boat," said Mr. Oliver. "She was very close to us. You had better keep your eyes open while I get dinner."
The rest of the dismal day passed uneventfully, but toward evening the haze commenced to roll aside and they saw blurred black pines looming up ahead of them. A little later they ran into Victoria harbor, and, hiring a Siwash to take them ashore, walked through the streets of what struck Frank as a very handsome city until they reached a hotel. Here they ordered supper, and after the meal was over the boys, who had changed their clothes, sat with Mr. Oliver in the almost deserted smoking room. He seemed to be expecting somebody, which somewhat astonished Frank, but he noticed that Harry smiled meaningly when Mr. Barclay walked in. He was dressed in light-colored sporting garments, with a belt around his waist and a leather patch on one shoulder, and there were gaudy trout flies stuck in his little cloth cap. He threw the cap on the table before he shook hands with Mr. Oliver and the boys, smiling as he caught Harry's eye.
"Well," he asked, indicating the flies, "what do you think of them?"
Harry grinned again as he laid his finger on one.
"You're not going to get many trout with that fellow, unless they've different habits in British Columbia. They won't come on for quite a while."
Mr. Barclay removed the fly and put it into a wallet.
"Thanks," he said. "It's some time since I did any fishing." Then he seemed to notice the manner in which the boy was surveying his clothing. "It's a sport's get-up, but are you acquainted with any reason why a United States citizen shouldn't get a little innocent amusement catching Canadian trout?"
"No, sir," answered Harry coolly. "Still, there are quite a few trout in the rivers on the American side of the boundary. It makes one wonder if you had anything else in view besides fishing in coming to British Columbia."
Mr. Barclay regarded him with an air of ironical reproof.
"In a general way, young man, it's most unwise to blurt the thing right out when you have a suspicion in your mind. It's better to let it stay there until you have good cause to act on it." He turned to Mr. Oliver. "I'm inclined to doubt the advisability of leaving your sloop lying where she is in full view of the wharf."
"Then you recognized her?"
"At a glance. The trouble is that there are one or two acquaintances of yours who might do the same."
Mr. Oliver looked thoughtful.
"I've been considering that, but it was getting dark when we ran in, and we had better move the first thing to-morrow. Now with this unsettled weather I'm not very keen on sailing up the west coast, which is open to the Pacific, and the place we are bound for is rather a long way."
"Then go east," advised Mr. Barclay. "There are a number of inlets on that side of the island within easy reach of the railroad, and you ought to reach thenearest of them in a few hours. I'll go on with the cars to-morrow, and if you don't get in at one of the way stations, I'll wait for you at Wellington. Then we could cross to the west coast by the Alberni stage and hire a couple of Indians and a sea canoe. It wouldn't be a long run from there."
Mr. Oliver agreed to this, and getting up early next morning, they slipped out of the harbor, and some hours afterward crept into a forest-girt inlet, where they left the sloop. There was a depot nearby, and getting on board the cars when the next train came in, they found Mr. Barclay awaiting them. Early in the afternoon they alighted at a little wooden, colliery town, and next day they crossed the island in the stage over a very rough trail which led through tremendous forests. Once they passed a wonderful blue lake lying deep-sunk between steep walls of hills. Then they crossed a divide and came winding down into a valley with water flashing at the foot of it. It was evening when they arrived at a straggling settlement on the banks of a riband of salt water twisting away among the forest-shrouded hills, and found several Indians there who had come up in their sea canoes.
Mr. Oliver hired a couple of them, and they started after they had purchased a few stores. A light, pine-scented breeze was blowing down the valley when they thrust the canoe off from the shingle. They had no sooner done so, however, when the dog arose with a deep growl which indicated that he objected to the Indians going with them. As his actions did not seem to have the desired effect he seized the nearest Indian by the leg, and it was only when Harry belabored him with a paddle that he could be induced to let go. Then he barked at them savagely until Frank drew him down upon his knee with a hand about his neck, while the Siwash raised two little masts. In the meanwhile the boy watched the men with interest, and decided thatthey had very little in common with the prairie Indians he had seen in pictures and from the cars.
They were dressed neatly in clothes which had evidently been purchased at a store, and though their faces were brown and their hair rather coarse and dark there was nothing else unusual about them. They talked with Mr. Oliver and Mr. Barclay freely in what Harry said was Chinook, a readily learned lingua-franca in use on parts of the Pacific Slope. Then Frank fixed his attention upon the canoe, a long, narrow, and beautifully shaped craft with the usual tall, bird's-head bow. She was rather shallow, but Harry said that this made her paddle fast. He added that though these canoes would sail reasonably well when the breeze was fair the Indians usually drove them to windward with the paddle unless the sea was too heavy, in which case they generally made for the beach and pulled the craft out.
Frank remembered that this, or something like it, was the ancient practice, and that it was only by slow degrees that man had discovered he could still make the wind propel his vessel to its destination when it blew from ahead. Greek and Roman triremes, Alexandrian wheat ships, and Viking galleys, had made wonderful voyages, and they all carried sail, but they set it only when the wind was fair. When it drew ahead they stowed their canvas and thrashed the lean hull through the seas with their long oars. Now, after perfecting his vessel's under-water body, inventing the center board, and learning how to make flat-setting sails, man was going back to the old-time plan, only that instead of relying upon the muscle of close-packed rowers he used improved propellers, tri-compound reciprocators and turbines.
One of the Siwash shook out the two spritsails which sat on a pole stretching up to the peak from the foot of the mast, and when he had led the sheets aft hiscompanion knelt astern with a paddle held over the gunwale. Slanting gently down to the faint breeze, the craft slid away through the smooth, green water with a long ripple running back behind her. The log houses dropped astern and were lost among the trees, a valley filled with somber forest, and a rampart of tall hillside, slipped by, and as they crept on from point to point the strip of still water stretched away before them between somber ranks of climbing trees.
Frank had no idea how far they had gone when the light began to fail, though he fancied that the shallow craft, now slipping forward so smoothly, was sailing a good deal faster than she seemed to be. At length one of the Siwash loosened the sheets and stowed the sails, while his companion turned the bows toward the beach. She slid in and grounded gently on a bank of shingle in a little cove, where a gigantic forest crept down to the water. They got out and ran her up, filled their kettle at a tinkling creek, hewed resinous chips from a fallen fir, and built a fire. Then they cut armfuls of thin spruce branches with which to make their beds, and presently sat down to an ample supper.
When it was over the Indians went down to the canoe, and Mr. Oliver and Mr. Barclay drew a little apart from the boys. Frank, lying near Harry beneath a big cedar, raised himself up on one elbow and watched the firelight flicker upon the mighty trunks. On the one hand they were lost in the gloom of the dense mass of dusky foliage, but on the other their great branches cut against the sky, which was still softly blue, and a blaze of silver radiance stretched across the water, for a half-moon had just sailed up above the opposite hill. Out of the silence there stole a faint whispering from the tops of the taller trees and the languid lapping of water among the stones, but there was no other sound, and once more Frank was glad that he had not exchangedthe stillness of the wilderness for the turmoil of the cities. He had now definitely decided to become a rancher.
It grew colder by and by, and wrapping his blanket around him, he wriggled down closer among the yielding spruce twigs. The great trunks grew dimmer and the smoke wisps which drifted among them became less distinct. By degrees they all grew mixed together—a confusion of sliding vapor and spectral trees—and he was conscious of nothing more.
A couple of days later the party pitched their camp in the depths of a lonely valley sloping to the Pacific, which was not far away. It was filled with great redwoods, balsams and cedars, and as Frank gazed at the endless rows of towering trunks it struck him as curious that Mr. Oliver's friend should think of buying this tract of giant forest for ranching land. He said so to Harry, who laughed.
"There's no rock or gravel on it and that counts for a good deal," said his companion. "If the soil looks as if it would grow things, it's about all the average man expects on this side of the Rockies. A few trees more or less don't matter. It's the same with us right down the Pacific Slope; the only difference is that on this island the firs seem just a little bigger." He appeared to admit the latter fact reluctantly, adding, "I guess that's because it's wetter in Canada."
They were standing outside a little tent of the kind most often used in the Western bush. It was supported by a ridge pole resting at either end upon two more, which were spread well apart at the bottom and crossed near the top. A short branch stay stretched back from each pair, and a few turns of cord lashing held the whole frame together. They had cut the poles in five minutes in the bush, and had brought the light cotton cover with them rolled up in a bundle. A good many men in that country live in such shelters during most of the year. Mr. Barclay sat on one of the hearth logs which wererolled close together in front of the tent and Mr. Oliver stood in the entrance.
"But the place must be such a tremendous way from a market," said Frank in response to Harry's last remark.
Mr. Oliver smiled. "It's not long since I tried to explain that a good many of the bush ranchers have to wait until the market comes to them. They stake their dollars and a number of years of hard work on the future of the country."
"Some of them get badly left now and then," said Mr. Barclay dryly. "You'll find laid-out townsites that have never grown up all along the Pacific Slope. There are stores and hotels falling to pieces in one or two I've struck." Then changing the subject: "Are you boys coming across with me to the river for some fishing to-morrow?"
They said that they would be glad to do so, and Mr. Barclay turned to Mr. Oliver. "We'll give you another two days to finish your surveying, and then we'll meet you at the rancherie on the inlet we spoke of. We can camp in the bush outside the tent for a couple of nights."
They started early the next morning, taking one Indian with them to pack their provisions, and the dog, who insisted on accompanying them. They were plodding along a hillside toward noon when Mr. Barclay, who was walking in front with their guide, looked back at the boys.
"Get hold of the dog as soon as we stop and keep him quiet," he cautioned.
After that they moved forward in silence for some minutes while the trees grew thinner ahead of them, until Mr. Barclay stopped behind a brake of undergrowth. The dog broke into a short, throaty bark and then growled hoarsely until Frank knelt beside him and laida hand upon his collar. When he had quieted the animal, who by degrees had become attached to him, he arose and found he could look down upon a narrow slit of valley into which the sunlight poured. A creek swirled through the bottom of it, and he was astonished to see a swarm of blue-clad figures toiling with grubhoe and shovel upon its banks, and a cluster of bark shelters in the widest part of the hollow.
"Chinamen!" he said. "What can they be doing? One never would have expected to find a colony of them here."
Mr. Barclay smiled in a somewhat curious fashion.
"They're washing gold. It's a remarkably simple process, if you're willing to work hard enough. You shovel out the soil and sand and keep on washing it until it's all washed away. Any gold there is remains in the bottom of the pan."
"But if there's gold in that creek, how is it there are no white men about?"
"Probably because they couldn't make wages. There's a little gold in a number of the creeks right down the Slope, but where the quantity's very small nobody but a Chinaman finds it worth while to look for it."
Mr. Barclay sat down and spent some minutes apparently carefully watching the blue-clad figures toiling in the sunlight below, after which he got up and signaled for them to go on again. The boys, however, dropped a little behind, and presently Harry gave his companion a nudge.
"I guess you noticed that when you said one wouldn't have expected to find those Chinamen here Barclay didn't answer it?"
"Yes," said Frank thoughtfully. "I suppose you mean he wasn't astonished when he saw them?"
"You've hit it, first time," Harry assented. "That man's on the trail, and though I can't tell you exactlywho he's getting after, I've my ideas." He paused with a chuckle. "I'm not sure now he's quite so much of a stuffed image as he seemed to be."
Frank said nothing in answer to this. A few minutes later Harry touched his arm as Mr. Barclay, turning suddenly, shouted:
"Get hold of the dog!"
Frank grabbed at the animal's collar but missed it, and the next moment the dog had vanished. Then there was a crash in the bush, and a beautiful slender creature with long legs and little horns shot out from behind a thicket and flung itself high into the air. It fell again, this time with scarcely a sound, into a clump of fern, rose out of it, and in a wonderful bound cleared a fallen trunk with broken branches projecting from it. Then it was lost in another thicket and the dog's harsh barking rang through the silence of the woods. Once or twice again Frank caught a momentary glimpse of a marvelously agile creature rising and falling among the undergrowth, and then there was only the yelping of the dog which became fainter and fainter and finally broke out at irregular intervals. Mr. Barclay sat down upon the fallen trees.
"I suppose we'll have to wait until that amiable pet of yours comes back," he said. "On the whole it's fortunate the deer broke out now instead of a quarter of an hour earlier."
They waited a considerable time before the dog crept up to them wagging his ragged tail in a disappointed manner. Harry shook his fishing rod at him threateningly.
"I'd lay into you good, only it wouldn't be any use," he said. "The more you're whacked, the worse you get."
The dog wagged his tail again and jumped upon Frank, who patted him before they resumed the march.
"It's rather curious, but that's the first deer I've seensince I've been in the country," he said. "Do they always jump like that?"
"Well," said Harry, "in a general way they are quite hard to see, and you can walk right past one without noticing it when it's standing still. Their colors match the trunks and the fern, and, what's more important, it's not often you can see the whole of them. In fact, I've struck as many deer by accident as I've done when I've been trailing them. Now and then you almost walk right up to one, though I haven't the least notion how it is they don't hear you, because as a rule the one you're trailing will leave you out of sight in a few moments if you snap a twig. Anyway, a scared deer goes over whatever lies in front of him. There are very few things he can't jump, and he comes down almost without a sound."
The rest of the journey proved uneventful, and early in the evening they made camp on the banks of a frothing river which swept out of the shadow crystal clear. In this it differed, as Harry explained, from most of the larger ones on the Pacific Slope, which are usually fed by melted snow and stained a faint green. Mr. Barclay, whose boots and clothes were already considerably the worse for wear, sat down beside a swirling pool and took out his pipe.
"There's no use pitching a fly across it yet, I suppose," he said. "We may as well get supper before we start."
The Siwash prepared the meal and remained behind with Mr. Barclay when it was over, while the two boys went down stream with a rod he had lent them which Harry insisted Frank should take. There were, he urged, plenty of trout in the river near his father's ranch, though it was very seldom he had leisure to go after them. They wandered on some distance beside the water, which ran almost west toward the Pacific,and wherever the forest was a little thinner the slanting sunrays streaming between the serried trunks smote along it. Frank, who had, as it happened, once or twice got a week or two's fishing in the East, kept his eyes open, but it was only twice that he fancied he noticed the faint dimple made by a short-rising trout.
"I'd have expected to find a river of this kind thick with fish," he said.
"There's sure to be a good many in it," answered Harry. "You wait about another half hour."
"What's the matter with starting now?" urged Frank. "Isn't that one rising in the slack yonder?"
"See if you can get him," said Harry, smiling.
Frank swung the rod, straining every effort to make a neat, clean cast, and he succeeded. The flies dropped lightly about a foot above the dimple made by the fish, and swept down stream across the spot where he had reason to suppose it was waiting. There was no response, however, and nothing broke the rippling surface when the flies floated down a second time. Frank laid down the rod.
"It's curious," he murmured.
Harry laughed. "Hold on a little. You've seen three fish rising now, and that's quite out of the common."
Frank sat down again, and waited until the sunlight faded off the river and the firs about it suddenly grew blacker. Soon afterward what seemed an almost solid cloud of tiny insects drifted along the surface of the water, which was immediately broken by multitudinous splashes.
"Now you can begin," said Harry.
Frank, clambering to a ledge of rock, swung his rod, and as the flies swept across an eddy there was a splash and a swirl and a sudden tightening of the line. He got the butt down as the winch commenced to clink, andHarry waded out into the stream lower down, holding his wide hat.
"Let him run, but keep a strain on," he cried. "You've got a big one."
The fish fought for three or four minutes, gleaming, a streak of silver, through the shadowy flood, as it showed its side, then sprang clear and changed again to a half-seen dusky shape that drove violently here and there. Then it came up toward the bending point of the rod, and at length Harry, slipping his hat beneath it, lifted it out.
"Nearly three quarters of a pound," he said. "Your trace is clear now. Try again, and never mind about the slack and eddies. Pitch your flies anywhere."
Frank did so, and they had scarcely fallen when there was a second rush, but this fish seemed smaller and he dragged it out unceremoniously upon the shingle. It was the same the next cast, and for a while he was kept desperately busy. When at length he laid the rod down Harry announced that they had a dozen fish.
"We'll try the next pool now," he added. "Some of these trout aren't half a pound and I'd like you to get a real big one."
The next pool proved to be some distance away and there was nothing but rock and foaming water between, but when they reached a slacker place where the current circled around a deep basin Frank had four or five more minutes' fishing, during which he landed several trout. Then the flies seemed to vanish and there was scarcely a splash on the shadowy water.
"You may as well put the rod up," Harry advised. "It's a sure thing you won't get another."
Frank tried for a few minutes, but finding his companion's prediction justified, sat down near him among the roots of a big fir. At the foot of the pool where he had been fishing the stream swept furiously betweenbig scattered boulders in a wild white rapid. It was narrower there, and a ledge of rock, slightly hollowed out underneath, rose above it on the side on which they sat a little more than a hundred yards away. The woods were now darkening fast, and the chill of the dew was in the air, which was heavy with the scent of redwood and cedar. In places the water still glimmered faintly, and except for the roar it made, everything was very still.
Suddenly Harry pointed to the dog, who was lying near Frank.
"Get hold of him," he said in a low voice. "If nothing else will keep him quiet, we'll roll your jacket round his head."
Frank, who had taken off his jacket, which was badly torn, when he began fishing, laid his hand on the dog as it arose with a low growl. Then as it tried to break away from him he seized its collar and held on with all his might while Harry flung the jacket over it. Though the thing cost them an effort they managed to hold the animal still between them. In the meanwhile there was a crackle of undergrowth and Frank saw a man who walked in a rather curious manner move out from the shadow. Even when he was clear of the overhanging branches it was impossible to see him distinctly, but Frank recognized him with a start. There was something wrong with one of the dark figure's shoulders.
The man moved on away from them, until he stopped at the edge of the overhanging rock, where he stood for a moment or two. Then he leaped out suddenly and alighted on the top of a boulder about which the white froth whirled. Frank fancied that only a very powerful person could have safely made such a leap, and there was no doubt that whatever it was that had caused the man's unusual gait, it had not affected his agility. The next moment, he jumped again, and, coming down rather more than knee-deep in the rapid,floundered through it and vanished into the shadow beneath the trees. Then Harry looked around at his companion with a smile.
"I'll own up that Barclay's smart, after all," he said. "He's sure on the trail. Anyway, perhaps we'd better head back to camp in case some more of them come along."
It was quite dark when they reached the fire the Siwash had made and found Mr. Barclay, who now seemed rather wet as well as ragged, sitting beside it with his pipe in his hand. When they had compared their fish with those he had killed they lay down among the withered needles on the opposite side of the fire.
"It's good fishing, sir, but you must be very keen to come so far for it," said Harry, looking up innocently at Mr. Barclay.
The red light of the fire was on Mr. Barclay's face and Frank saw that he glanced thoughtfully at Harry.
"It certainly is," he answered. "I believe you have already said something very much like your last remark. Still, you see, I don't propose to come often."
Frank suppressed a chuckle. If Harry had intended to surprise the man into some admission he had not succeeded yet.
"And we go on to the rancherie in a couple of days," Harry added. "From what the Indians told me I don't think we'd get any fishing there. Wouldn't it be better to stay here a little longer?"
"No," said Mr. Barclay, "quite apart from the difficulty of sending your father word, what you suggest doesn't strike me as advisable, for one or two reasons."
Harry seemed to realize that he was making no progress, and, looking meaningly at Frank, suddenly changed his tactics.
"There's something I should perhaps have told you, sir, though I don't know whether it will interest you. Anyway, not long ago Frank and I were up at theChinese colony behind the settlement near our ranch. Perhaps you have been there?"
"I've heard of it," said Barclay dryly.
Then in a few words Harry described how the man they had endeavored to trail had vanished at the Chinaman's shack, and Frank saw a look of eager interest cross Mr. Barclay's usually stolid face.
"You suggest that the fellow didn't want you to see him?" he asked.
"That was certainly how it struck me."
"And he walked rather curiously and one shoulder seemed a little higher than the other? I think you mentioned that?"
"I did," repeated Harry.
Mr. Barclay seemed to reflect, but there was now sign of deeper interest in his expression.
"Did you notice whether he had red hair and gray eyes?"
"No," said Harry with a grin, "though I can't be sure about it, I've a notion that his hair was dark. As it happened, I only saw his back, but I'd know the man again." He paused impressively. "In fact, I hadn't the least trouble about it when I saw him half an hour ago."
Mr. Barclay started and there was no doubt that he was astonished at this.
"You ran up against him here!"
"No," said Harry, "I only watched him from behind a fir. He crossed the creek heading south and didn't notice us."
Mr. Barclay settled back again and seemed lost in thought. "After all," he said shortly, "it's possible."
Then he changed the subject and they talked about fishing until the fire died down, when they spread their blankets upon their couches of soft spruce twigs.
It was early in the evening when after a toilsome march Mr. Barclay and the boys reached a Siwash rancherie built just above high-water mark on the pebbly beach of a sheltered inlet. Frank had already discovered that the northern part of the Pacific Slope is a land of majestic beauty, but he had so far seen nothing quite so wild and rugged as the surroundings of the Indian dwelling. Behind it, a great rock fell almost sheer, leaving only room for a breadth of shingle between its feet and the strip of clear green water. On the opposite side mighty firs climbed the face of a towering hill so steep that Frank wondered how they clung to it, and at the head of the tremendous chasm a crystal stream came splashing out of eternal shadow. Seaward a wet reef guarded the inlet's mouth, with its outer edge hidden by spouts of snowy foam, upon which the big Pacific rollers broke continually, ranging up in tall green walls and crumbling upon the stony barrier with a deep vibratory roar which rang in long pulsations across the stately pines.
The rancherie was a long and rather ramshackle, single-storied, wooden building not unlike a frame barn, only lower, and Frank discovered that although it was inhabited by the whole Siwash colony there were no divisions in it, but each inmate or family claimed its allotted space upon the floor. A tall pole rudely carved with grotesque figures stood in front of it, and it occurred to Frank as he inspected them that he was face to face with the rudiments of heraldry. The nobles of ancientEurope, he remembered, blazoned devices of this kind upon their shields, and their descendants still painted their lions and griffins and eagles upon their carriages and stamped them upon their note paper. He was probably right in his surmises, though there are different views upon the subject of totem poles, and the Siwash, who ought to know most about them, seem singularly unwilling to supply inquirers with any reliable information.
A group of brown-faced, black-haired men and women dressed much as white folks stood about the rancherie, and near them were ranged rows of shallow trays of bark containing drying berries. Frank noticed that the woods were full of the latter—hat berries, salmon berries, and splendid black and yellow raspberries. Several big sea canoes were drawn up at the edge of the water, and Mr. Oliver sat near one of them with another cluster of Siwash gathered about him. They had spread a number of peltries out upon the stones, which Mr. Oliver explained were seal skins. Frank examined one, and found it difficult to believe that this coarse, greasy, and nastily smelling hair was the material out of which the beautiful glossy furs were made. He confided his views to Harry.
"Yes," said the latter, "they're not much to look at now. They have to go through quite a lot of dressing, and I've heard that in the first place all the long outside hair is plucked out. There's an inner coat." He looked at the men. "It's done in England, isn't it?"
Mr. Barclay smiled. "A good deal of it is, anyway." Then he addressed Mr. Oliver. "You're buying some of these peltries?"
"One or two," was the answer. "We want an excuse for this visit."
Mr. Barclay made a sign of assent, and after chaffering with the Indians for a few moments Mr. Oliver broke in again: "They're cheap, that's sure. I supposethese fellows would rather sell them on the spot for dollars down than pack them along down to Alberni or some other place where they'd probably have to take grocery stores in payment. If you're open to make a deal we'll take two or three between us. We ought to get our money back with something over in Victoria."
Mr. Oliver kept up the bargaining for a while, and then explained that he and his companion did not care for the rest of the skins, which were inferior to those they had chosen. One of the Siwash thereupon informed him that more canoes were expected in a day or two, adding that he would probably be able to show them further peltries if they could wait their arrival.
"Tell him we'll stay," said Mr. Barclay. "At the same time you had better ask him if there's any likelihood of our getting down to Victoria by water. You can say we've had about enough crawling through the bush—it's a fact thatIhave—and lead up to the question naturally."
Frank, observing a twinkle in Harry's eyes, watched the Indians' faces when Mr. Oliver addressed them, but they remained perfectly expressionless.
"I can't get anything out of them about the schooner," Mr. Oliver reported at length. "This fellow says the easiest way would be to send our Indians back for the canoe, which I'll do. It's possible that we may chance upon a little more information later on."
"Where do they get the skins?" Frank asked presently, when the Indians had left them.
"That's a point they don't seem much inclined to talk about," Mr. Barclay answered. "They probably follow them in their canoes as they work up north, though it's only odd seals they pick up in that way. The principal supply comes from the Pribyloff Islands up in the Bering Sea. It's supposed that with the exception of a few which frequent some reefs lying nearer Russian Asia practically all the seals in the NorthPacific haul out there for two or three months every year. The American lessees club them on the land, but the crews of the Canadian schooners kill a number in open water outside our limit. They claim that although the seals are born on American beaches we don't own them when they're in the sea, but, as it's suggested that they're not always very particular about their exact distance from the islands, their proceedings make trouble every now and then. I'm talking about the fur seals; there are several other kinds which are more or less common everywhere."
He broke off and sat smoking silently for a while, looking at the skins.
"They seem to have taken your fancy," Mr. Oliver observed presently.
"It's a fact," Mr. Barclay assented. "I was just thinking I'd like to take that big one and the other yonder home with me. My daughter Minnie visits East in the winter now and then, and she's fond of furs, though so far I haven't been able to buy her any particularly smart ones. There's a man I know in Portland who can fix up a skin as well as any one in London. He was a good many years in Alaska trading furs for the A. C. C., and some of the Russians who stayed behind there taught him to dress them."
Mr. Oliver laughed. "I suppose the thing is quite out of the question?"
"It is," said Mr. Barclay dryly. "You ought to know that the United States charges a big duty on foreign furs."
"On foreign ones!" broke in Harry, nudging Frank. "A seal born on an American beach could certainly be considered an American seal."
"When you import goods into the United States you require a certificate of origin, young man."
"That fixes the thing," said Harry. "On your ownshowing, those seals originated on the Pribyloffs. They're American."
"Ingenious!" exclaimed Mr. Barclay, with a longing glance at the skins. "There's some reason in that contention, but won't you go on? You don't seem to have got through yet."
"In case you felt justified in taking a skin or two," continued Harry thoughtfully, "I'd like to point out that, as a rule, the Customs fellows don't trouble about a sloop the size of ours. We just run up to our moorings when we come back from a yachting trip, and there's a nice little nook forward which would just hold a bundle of those peltries. It's hidden beneath the second cable."
Mr. Barclay picked up a piece of shingle and flung it at him.
"You can stop right now before you get yourself into difficulties. What do you mean by proposing a smuggling deal to a man connected with the United States revenue?"
"I'm sorry," Harry answered with a chuckle. "I should have waited until the rest had gone."
Mr. Barclay regarded him severely, though his eyes twinkled.
"Your smartness is going to make trouble for you by and by," he said. "Go and see what that Siwash is doing about our supper."
Harry moved away, but presently came back to announce that the meal was ready. When it was over the boys strolled off toward the reef, leaving the men sitting smoking on the beach.
"That boy of yours told me what seemed a rather curious thing last night," said Mr. Barclay, and he briefly ran over what Harry had related about the man with the peculiar shoulder.
Mr. Oliver listened in evident astonishment.
"It's the first time I've heard of the matter," he exclaimed. "What do you make of it?"
"In the meanwhile I don't quite know what to think. If that man is boss of the gang it explains a good deal that has been puzzling me, but I must own it's considerably more than I expected. The general idea was that he'd cleared out of the country, which would have been a very natural course in view of the fact that he'd probably have been sandbagged if he'd show himself after dark on any wharf of two of the coast states. Anyway, your son's description was quite straight. He seemed sure of him."
"Harry's eyes are as good as yours or mine," said Mr. Oliver with a smile. Mr. Barclay wrinkled his brow.
"There's a point that struck me—though I can't say if it explains the thing. The boy's only young yet, he has imagination and, it's possible, a fondness for detective literature, like the rest of them. Now we'll assume that he had heard of a certain sensational case—a particularly grewsome crime on board an American ship—and the arrest of the rascal accused of it. I needn't point out that the fellow only escaped on a technical point of law and that his picture figured in some of the papers. Isn't that the kind of thing that's likely to make a marked impression on the youthful mind?"
"I can see two objections," responded Mr. Oliver. "In the first place, Harry was away in Idaho while the case was going on. The second one's more important. Harry might try to put the laugh on you, as he did not long ago, but when he makes a concise statement it's to be relied upon. In such a case I've never known him to let his imagination run away with him."
Mr. Barclay spread his hands out in a deprecatory manner.
"Then we'll take the thing for granted, and it certainlysimplifies the affair. I'd no trouble in finding the Chinese colony, and though I've no idea how they get the dope, that doesn't matter. The point is that it's very seldom anybody is likely to disturb them in this part of the bush, and there are two inlets handy. A schooner could slip in here a dozen times without being noticed by anybody except the Siwash. Then we have the fact that a notorious rascal who has evidently a hand in the thing was seen heading for the Chinese colony. It seems to me decisive."
"What are you going to do about it?" Mr. Oliver asked.
"Wait and keep my eyes open. If it appears advisable I may communicate with the Canadian authorities later on, though, of course, we must contrive to get our hands on the fellows in American waters. I've an idea it can be done."
Mr. Oliver said nothing further, and by and by, when a thin haze rolled down from the hillside and night closed in, they strolled toward the rancherie, where they were given a strip of floor space not far from the entrance. The boys came in a little later and lay down apart from them and nearer the door, but Frank did not go to sleep. The rancherie was hot and the dull roar of the combers on the reef came throbbing in and made him restless. He lay still for what seemed a considerable time, and at last there was a low sound which might have been made by somebody rising stealthily, after which a dim black object flitted out of the door. Then Harry, who lay close to him, touched his arm.
"Are you asleep?" he asked very softly.
"No," answered Frank. "Where's that fellow going?"
"Get out as quietly as you can," was Harry's reply.
Frank had kept his shirt and trousers on, and after feeling for his boots he arose cautiously, holding themin his hand. In another moment or two he had slipped out into the cool night air and was crossing the shingle in his stockinged feet. Once or twice a stone rattled, but he supposed the sound was lost in the clamor of the reef, for nobody seemed to hear it. When they had left the rancherie some distance behind they sat down.
"Now," said Harry, "I'll tell you my idea. They're expecting the schooner and don't want her to run in while we're about. They've probably had a man on the lookout down by the entrance, and I expect the fellow who went out has been sent by the boss or Tyee to learn if the other one has seen her."
"It's curious some of them didn't hear us," Frank observed thoughtfully.
"I'm not sure that they didn't," Harry admitted. "Anyway, they couldn't stop us without some excuse, and, if I'm right, they certainly wouldn't want to tell us why they wished us to stay in. Of course," he added, "it might make them suspicious, but I don't know any reason why we should point that out to Barclay. The great thing is to keep out of sight in case they follow us."
They put on their boots and crept along in the gloom beneath the rock, heading toward the reefs. A little breeze blew down the hollow, setting the dark firs to sighing, and part of the inlet lay black in their shadow. The rest sparkled in the light of a half-moon which had just risen above the crest of the hill. They could hear the soft splash and tinkle of water rippling among the stones, but now and then this sound was drowned as the roar of the reef grew louder and deeper. Presently a dim, filmy whiteness in front of them resolved itself into a glimmering spray cloud and fountains of spouting foam, and when at length they stopped among a cluster of wet boulders they could see a black ridge of rock thrusting itself out, half buried, into a mad turmoil of frothing water. It lay in the shadow of the rock, and there wasno moonlight on the ghostly combers which came seething down upon it. A little outshore, however, the sea sparkled with a silvery radiance except where the shadow of a black head fell upon it. There was not more than a moderate breeze, but the Pacific surge breaks upon and roars about those reefs continually.