“He worked for several days on the cipher, and one day came to me with a radiant face. He told me he had solved it. No wonder I had failed. It was a simple enough cipher—one of the least complex, in fact—but the language used had been Latin, in which my ancestor, as a well-bred Englishman of that day, was proficient. As he was telling me this, I noticed a man I had hired some days before, hanging about the open windows. I ordered him away, and he went at once. But I had grave suspicions that he had overheard a good deal more than I should have wished him to. However, there was no help for it. I dismissed the matter from my mind, and we—the professor and I—spent the rest of the day discussing the cipher and the best means for recovering the treasure. We agreed it would be dangerous to take men we could not absolutely trust, and yet, we should require several people to organize a proper expedition.
“But, as it so happened, all our plans had to be changed that night. I was awakened soon after midnight by a noise in my room. In the dim light I saw a figure that I recognized as our gardener, moving about. The lamp beside my bed had, for some reason, not gone out when I turned it down on retiring, and I soon had the room in a blaze of light. The intruder sprang toward me, a big club in his hand. I dodged the blow and grappled with him. In the struggle his beard fell off, and I recognized, to my amazement, that our ‘gardener’ was Stonington Hunt himself.
“The shock of this surprise had hardly been borne in upon me when the fellow, who possessed considerable strength, forced me back against the table. In the scuffle the lamp was upset. In a flash the place was in a blaze. Hunt was out of the room in two bounds. He seized the key, as he went, and locked the door on the outside, thus leaving me to burn to death, or chance injury by a leap from the window, which overhung a cliff above the lake. I had just time to throw on a few clothes and grab the papers, which I had luckily placed under my pillow, before the flames drove me out. The wood of the door was flimsy, and without bothering to try to force the lock, I smashed out a panel. Crawling through, I aroused my friend Jorum and my old negro servant, Jumbo.
“We saved nothing but the precious papers, but as the bungalow was roughly furnished, I did not much care. We made our way to a distant house and stayed there the night. The next day we took a wagon to the shore of the lake and went by boat to Whitehall. There we embarked on a train for Albany, where my daughter was at the home of friends. I, too, have a residence there, but, having received an invitation from friends to visit them on Long Island, I decided to give my little girl a motor trip.
“But while in Albany I perceived I was being followed, and by the two men whom you have described to me as taking part in the filching of the wallet. I thought I had thrown them off, however, but your adventure to-day proves that I have not been as successful as I hoped. The most unfortunate part of it is that the cipher was in that wallet.”
“And it’s gone,” groaned Tubby dolorously.
“I’m not so sure of that. I am hopeful that we may recover it,” said the retired officer. “I have wired my friend Jorum, who, with Jumbo, is now in New York, and I am in hopes that he can recollect something of his translation of the cipher. If not—well, there’s no use crossing bridges till we come to them.”
“If you do recover it?” asked Rob.
“If I do, I am going to ask your parents to let me borrow a patrol of Boy Scouts to aid in the treasure hunt,” smiled the major.
“My dear Major,” cried Mr. Blake, holding up his hands, “Mrs. Blake would never consent to——”
“But there would be such a lot of fun, dad,” urged Rob. “Think of a camp in the mountains. We’d have to camp, wouldn’t we, Major?”
“Certainly. It would be a fine opportunity for you to perfect yourselves in——”
“Woodcraft,” said Tubby.
“Signaling,” put in Merritt.
“I’ve got a field wireless apparatus I’d like to try out,” put in Hiram, his voice a-quiver with eagerness.
“Well, the first thing to be done is to recover that cipher,” said the major; “at present all we know of it is that it is in the hands of two rascals.”
“In the employ of another rascal, Stonington Hunt,” put in Rob.
“Well, we can do nothing more to-night,” said the major.
“No. We were so interested in your story that I think none of us noticed how the time flew by,” said Mr. Blake, and Mrs. Blake, entering just then, announced that there was supper ready for the party in the dining-room. Tubby’s eyes glittered at this news.
Soon after the sandwiches, cakes and lemonade had been disposed of, the Boy Scouts set out for home, agreeing to meet the major next morning after breakfast.
They had not gone many steps from the house when Tubby stopped as suddenly as if he had been shot.
“Gingersnaps!” he exclaimed. “I’ve just thought of something.”
“Goodness! Must hurt,” jeered Merritt unsympathetically.
“No—that is, yes—no, I mean,” sputtered the fat boy. “Say, fellows, I heard this afternoon that Sam Phelps from Aquebogue told a fellow in the village that he had seen Freeman Hunt over there this morning.”
“You double-dyed chump,” exclaimed Rob, who was walking a way with them, “and you never said anything about it. If Freeman was there, I’ll bet his father was, too, and that’s where those two men have gone.”
“Gee whiz, if they have they must be there yet, then!” exclaimed Merritt, excitedly, “unless they left by automobile.”
“How’s that?” demanded Rob.
“It’s this way. There was no train after those chaps took the wallet, till almost eight o’clock. They must have hidden in the woods and caught it some place below, unless Si arrested them.”
“He’d have been at the house to get the reward if he had,” rejoined Rob.
“Very well, then. He didn’t catch them, and if the Hunts are at Aquebogue, that’s where they’ve gone.”
“Yes, but what’s to prevent them leaving there?”
“No train after nine-thirty till to-morrow morning, and the eight o’clock from here doesn’t get to Aquebogue till after that time; so they must be stranded there, unless they have a car.”
“Cookies and cream cakes! That’s right!” cried Tubby, “let’s phone the police at Aquebogue to look out for them.”
But the lads found that the wire between Hampton and Aquebogue wasn’t working. The telegraph office was closed. They exchanged blank glances.
“What are we going to do?” demanded Tubby.
“What all good scouts ought to do—the best we can,”—rejoined Rob.
“And that is, under the present circumstances?” questioned Merritt.
“To go to our garage—Blenkinsop’s—on Main Street, and get out the car.”
“It’ll be closed,” rejoined Tubby.
“I’ve got a key,” replied Rob; “I’ll ’phone the house that I’m going for a night spin. We can get there, notify the police, and be back in two hours.”
“Forward, scouts!” ordered Merritt, in sharp, “parade-ground” tones, “and ‘Be Prepared’ for whatever comes along.”
Rob found that the telephone to his home was also out of order, owing to repairs which were being rushed through by night. So ten minutes later, when the car glided out of the garage on Main Street and slipped silently through the sleeping town, there was nobody in Hampton who knew the Boy Scouts’ night mission.
The auto, a fast and heavy machine, plunged along through the night at a great rate. Its bright searchlight cast a brilliant circle of radiance far ahead into the darkness. Occasionally frightened birds could be seen flying out of the inky hedges, falling bewildered in the path of the white glare.
It was exhilarating, blood-stirring work, all the more keenly delightful from the sense of adventure with which it was spiced.
Rob was at the wheel, steering straight and steady. He knew the road well. Part of it had been the scene of that thrilling night ride described inThe Boy Scouts and the Army Airship, when the boys had overtaken the two thieves who had stolen the aeroplane documents. On that occasion, it will be recalled, an accident had been narrowly averted by a soul-stirring hair’s breadth, as a train dashed across the tracks.
Rob’s three companions sat back in the tonneau and conversed in low tones. Only the irrepressible Tubby was not duly impressed with the momentousness of the occasion. From time to time a snicker of laughter showed that he was cracking jokes in the same old way.
“Say,” he remarked, as they bumped across the railroad tracks, “even if we do find out where these fellows are, I don’t know just what we’re going to do with them at this time of night. Reminds me——”
“Oh, for goodness’ sake, Tubby,” groaned Merritt.
“Let him go ahead,” struck in Hiram, “the sooner he blows off all his steam the sooner he’ll shut up for good.”
“Reminds me,” went on the unruffled Tubby, “of what a little girl said to her mother when the kid asked her what sardines were. The mother explained that they were small fish that big ones ate. Then the little girl wanted to know how the big fish got them out of the tins.”
There was a deathly silence, broken only by a low groan from Merritt.
“Call that a joke?” he moaned.
“Don’t spring any more. My life ain’t insured, by heck,” put in Yankee Hiram.
“Well, that got a laugh in the minstrel show where I heard it,” responded the aggrieved joke-smith.
Before long, lights flashed ahead of them, and, descending a steepish hill, they chugged into the town of Aquebogue. It was a fairly large town, and here and there lighted windows showed that some of the low resorts were still open for business. Far down the street shone two green lights, which marked the police station. The auto glided up to this, and Rob jumped out, accompanied by Merritt, leaving Tubby and Hiram in the car.
“Let’s get out and stretch our legs a bit,” said Tubby presently. It was taking some time for Rob to explain his errand to a sleepy police official.
“All right, my boy,” drawled Hiram. “I’m not averse to a bit of leg-stretching.”
The two lads got out and strolled as far as the street corner.
“H’s’h!” exclaimed Tubby suddenly, as they reached it. He seized Hiram’s arm with every appearance of excitement.
“Wa-al, what is it now?” asked the down-east boy; “more jokes and didoes?”
“No. See that chap just sneaking down the street from the opposite corner?”
“Yes; what of it? Are you seeing things?”
“No. But it’s Freeman Hunt—I’m sure of it.”
“By ginger, I believe you are right! It does look like him, for a fact. But what can he be doing here?”
“I’ve no more idea than you. But he must be up to some mischief.”
“Reckon that’s right.”
“I tell you that where Freeman Hunt is, his father is not far off, and the rest of the gang must be about here, too. I guess it was a good thing we came out here.”
“Well, what shall we do? Go back and tell the police?”
“No. While we were gone he’d sneak away, and we might miss him altogether. I’ve got a better plan.”
“Do tell!”
“We’ll follow him at a distance and see where he goes. Then we can come back and report.”
“Sa-ay, that’s a good idea. Come on.”
Freeman Hunt was almost out of sight now. But as the two scouts took up the trail, they saw him pause where a flood of light streamed from the window of a drinking-place. He paused here for an instant and gave a low whistle; presently the boys’ hearts gave a bound. From the doors of the resort issued three figures, one of which they recognized, even at that distance, as Stonington Hunt. With him were the two men who had played such a prominent part in the filching of the wallet belonging to Major Dangerfield.
“Keep in the shadow,” whispered Tubby, crouching in a convenient doorway; “they haven’t seen us. Hullo, there they go. Keep a good distance behind—as far back as we can, without losing them.”
The men the scouts were trailing struck into a lively pace. They seemed to be conversing earnestly. Through the shadows the two boys crept along behind them. Presently they were traversing a residence street, edged with elms and lawns and white picket fences. It was deserted and silent. The occupants of the houses were wrapped in sleep.
“Maybe they’re going to turn into one of these houses,” whispered Hiram.
But the men didn’t. Instead, they kept right on, and before long the last electric light had been passed and they were in the open country.
“Hadn’t we better turn back?” murmured Hiram. “It looks as if we were going too far for safety.”
“Let’s keep on,” urged Tubby. “There’s no danger. If we gave up the chase now we’d have had all our work for nothing.”
Hiram made no reply, and the two boys, taking advantage of every bit of cover—as the game of “Hare and Hounds” had taught them—kept right on dogging the footsteps of their quarry. All at once Tubby began sniffing the air.
“We’re getting near the sea,” he proclaimed. “I can smell the salt meadows.”
Aquebogue lay some distance back from the open waters of the ocean. It was situated, like Hampton itself, on an inlet. In the dim light of the stars, the two boys presently perceived that they were traversing a sort of dyke or raised road leading across the marshes.
“Where can they be going?” wondered Hiram.
“Don’t know. But there are lots of fishermen’s huts and shacks dotted about in the marshes. Maybe they are making for one of them.”
“Maybe,” opined Hiram, “but if you weren’t so all-sot on following them, I’d be in a good mind to turn back.”
“Not yet,” persisted Tubby, and the chase continued.
But it was soon to end. All at once the faint glimmer of a watercourse, or inlet from the sea, shone dimly in front of them. Upreared, too, against the star-spangled sky, they could see the inky outlines of a structure of some kind.
“Crouch down here,” said Tubby suddenly, as the men ahead of them came to a halt.
A bunch of marsh grass offered a convenient hiding place, and behind it the two boys lay flat. Pretty soon they heard the scratch of a match, and then the grating of a lock, as the door of the dark building they had remarked was opened. The men entered the place and slammed the door to. A few instants later, from the solitary window of the shack, a light shone out. The window was toward the creek, and the glare from it showed the two watching boys the mast and rigging of a large sloop. At least, from her spars, they judged her to be of considerable size.
“Gee whiz!” exclaimed Tubby, “we’ve found the place, all right. They must have come in that sloop. Maybe that’s the way the two men who took the wallet got out of Hampton unobserved.”
“But the wind’s against the sloop, and she couldn’t have beaten her way down here in that time,” objected Hiram.
“She might have an engine, mightn’t she?” whispered Tubby in scornful tones.
“That’s so. Lots of boats do have gasoline motors. I guess you’re right, Tubby. What are you going to do now? Go back?”
“Not much,” rejoined the fat boy. “We’ll just have a look into that hut and see what’s going on. We might even get a chance to get that wallet back.”
“Say, you’re not going to take such a chance! If you looked through that window——”
“Did I say I was going to look through the window, stupid? Don’t you see that chimney on the roof? Now, the roof comes down low, almost to the ground. I’m going to climb up on it, and, by leaning over the chimney, I can hear what is said.”
“But they’ll hear your feet on the roof,” objected the practical Hiram.
“I’m going to take my shoes off.”
“It’s awfully risky, Tubby.”
“Say, look here, Hiram,” sputtered the fat boy, “if this country was to go to war, you’d want to go to the front and fight for Old Glory as a Boy Scout, wouldn’t you?”
“Of course.”
“Well, then, don’t you suppose that if you were scouting after an enemy you’d have to take bigger chances than this?”
Hiram said no more. Kicking their shoes off, and leaving them by the grass hummock, the two boys crept forward as silently as two cats. In the yielding sand their feet made no noise.
As Tubby had surmised, at the rear of the house the roof came almost to the ground, for the sand was heaped up against that particular wall, being driven in big dunes by the winds off the ocean.
“Up with you,” whispered Tubby, giving Hiram a “boost.” The Yankee boy’s long legs carried him onto the roof in a jiffy. Then came Tubby. Already the two boys could hear below them the low hum of voices, Freeman Hunt’s sharp, boyish tones mingling with the bass drone of the elder men’s conversation.
The roof was formed of driftwood and old timbers, and was as easy to climb as a staircase. Before many seconds, the boys were at the chimney. With beating pulses and a heart that throbbed faster than was altogether comfortable, in spite of his easy-going disposition, Tubby raised himself and peered down the flue. It was of brick. But to his astonishment, as he peered over the edge, he found he had a clear view of the room below.
The chimney, as is often the case in rough dwellings, did not go all the way down to the floor. Instead, it was supported on two beams, so that, peering down it, the boy could command a view of the room below, just as if he had been looking down a telescope.
Round a table were seated Stonington Hunt, the two rough-looking men who had stolen the wallet, and Freeman Hunt. A smoky glass lamp stood on the rough box which served for a table. Spread out on the table, too, was something that almost made Tubby let go his hold of the chimney and go sliding down the roof. It was the wallet, and beside it lay the paper covered with figures and markings, which, the boy had no doubt, was the precious document of the major.
“We’ll have to get out of here early in the morning,” Stonington Hunt was saying. “I don’t fancy having the police on my heels.”
“No. And Jim here says that those pesky Boy Scouts are mixed up in the search for the wallet,” struck in Freeman Hunt.
“Well, this is the time we give those brats the slip,” growled his father. “Come on, let’s turn in. We’ll get the motor going and drop down the creek before daylight.”
“Better leave the light burning then,” said one of the men who had been in Hampton that afternoon.
This was done, and presently snores and heavy breathing showed the men were asleep. Tubby could not see what resting places they had found, but assumed that there must be bunks around the edge of the hut, as is usual in such fishermen’s shelters.
Before retiring, the men had shoved the paper into the wallet, but for some reason, probably they didn’t think of it during their preparations for sleep, the wallet had been left on the table. It was almost directly below the chimney. As Tubby looked at it, he had a sudden idea.
“Got a bit of wire, Hiram?” he asked, knowing that the mechanical genius of the Eagle Patrol usually carried such odds and ends with him.
“Guess I’ve got a bit of brass wire right here,” rejoined Hiram, “but it isn’t very long.”
“Long enough,” commented Tubby, scrutinizing the bit handed to him, “now, if you had some string——”
“Got a bit of fish line.”
“Couldn’t be better. Give it to me.”
Much mystified, Hiram watched the fat boy bend the bit of wire and tie it to the string.
“Going fishing?” he asked in a sarcastic tone.
“Yes,” replied Tubby quite seriously.
His quick eye had noted that the straps that closed the wallet had not been placed round it but lay in a loose loop on the table. If only he could entangle his improvised line in the loop, it would be an easy matter to fish up the wallet. If only he could do it!
Very cautiously, for he knew the risk he was running, Tubby lowered his line. Then he waited. But the breathing below continued steady and stentorian. Swinging his hook, which was quite heavy, the stout boy grappled cautiously for the wallet. It was tantalizing and delicate work. But after taking an infinity of pains, he finally succeeded in getting it fast.
Tubby at this moment had difficulty in suppressing a shout of “hooray!” But he mastered his emotions, and slowly and delicately began to haul in his “catch.” Hiram, fascinated, crept close to his side. Perhaps it was this fact that was responsible for the disaster that occurred the next instant.
Without the slightest warning, save a sharp, cracking sound, the roof caved in under their feet. In a flash, both boys were projected in a heap into the room below. As they hurtled through the rotten covering of the hut, shouts and cries resounded from the aroused occupants.
The wildest confusion ensued. Fortunately, the drop was a short one, and beyond a few scratches and bruises, neither boy was hurt. The lamp, by some strange fatality, was not put out, but rolled off the table. As Stonington Hunt sprang at him, Tubby seized it. He brandished it threateningly.
“The Boy Scouts!” shouted Stonington Hunt, the first to recover from his stupefaction at the sudden interruption to their slumbers.
He dashed at Tubby, who swung the lamp for an instant—it was his only weapon—and then dashed it, like a smoky meteor, full at the advancing man’s head.
It missed him by the fraction of an inch, or he would have been turned into a living torch.
Crash!
The lamp struck the opposite wall, and was shattered into a thousand fragments. Instantly the place was plunged in darkness, total and absolute. At the same instant a sharp report sounded. It seemed doubly loud in the tiny place. The fumes of the powder filled it reekingly.
“Don’t shoot!” roared Stonington Hunt. “Guard the door and window. Don’t let them get away.”
“All right, dad,” the boys heard Freeman Hunt cry loudly, as he scuffled across the room.
“Keep the doorway and the window,” shouted Stonington Hunt. “I’ll have a light in a jiffy. We’ve got them like two rats in a cage.”
As he struck a match and lit a boat lantern that stood on a shelf, a low groan came from one corner of the room. Hiram was horrified to perceive that it was Tubby who uttered it. The shot must have wounded him, fired at haphazard, as it had been. The man who had aimed it, the bearded member of the gang, stood grimly by the doorway.
Almost beside himself at the hopelessness of their situation, Hiram gazed about him. All at once he noticed that on Tubby’s chest a crimson stain was slowly spreading. The stout boy lay quite still except for an occasional quiver and groan. Without a thought as to his danger, Hiram disregarded Stonington Hunt’s next injunction: “Don’t move a step.”
Swiftly he crossed to his wounded comrade. He sank on his knees beside him.
“T-T-T-Tubby,” he exclaimed, “are you badly hurt, old man?”
To his amazement, the recumbent Tubby gave him a swift but knowing wink, and then, rolling over on his side again, resumed his groaning once more. Mystified, but comforted, Hiram was rising, when a rough hand seized him and sent him spinning to an opposite corner. It was the burly form of the bearded man that had propelled him.
“Not so rough, Jim Dale,” warned Stonington Hunt. “We’ve got them where they can’t escape. Lots of time to get what we want out of them.”
“The pesky young spies,” snorted Jim Dale, “I wonder how much they overheard of what we said.”
“It don’t matter, anyhow,” put in his beardless companion of the afternoon. “They won’t have no chance to tell it.”
“Guess that’s right, Pete Bumpus,” struck in the bearded man. Suddenly Hiram felt a stinging slap across the face. He turned and faced young Freeman Hunt.
“How do you like that, eh?” snarled the youth viciously. “Here is where I pay you out for what you Scout kids did to me when we lived in Hampton.”
He was stepping forward to deliver another blow, when Hiram ducked swiftly, and put into execution a maneuver Rob had shown him. As Freeman, a bigger and heavier lad, rushed forward, Hiram’s long leg and his long left arm shot out simultaneously. The leg engaged Freeman’s ankle, and the Yankee lad’s fist encountered the other’s chin with a sharp crack. Freeman Hunt fell in a heap on the floor. Hiram braced himself for an attack by the whole four. But it didn’t come. Instead, they seemed to think it a good joke.
“That will teach you to keep your temper,” laughed the boy’s father roughly; “plenty of time to punch him and pummel him when we have them tied up.”
“Maybe I won’t do it, too,” promised Freeman, gathering himself up, with a crestfallen look.
Stonington Hunt stepped up to Hiram.
“Tell me the truth, you young brat,” he snarled; “are the police after us?”
Hiram pondered an instant before answering. Then he decided on a course of action. Possibly it was a bad one, judging by the immediate results.
“Yes, they are,” he said boldly, “and if you don’t let us loose, you’ll get in trouble.”
Stonington Hunt paused irresolutely. Then he said:
“Get the sloop ready, boys. We’ll get out of here on the jump.”
A few moments later Hiram’s hands were bound and he was led on board the craft the boys had noticed lying in the creek. A plank connected it with the shore. Tubby, still groaning, was carried on board and thrown down in the bow beside Hiram.
“We’ll attend to him after a while,” said Hunt brutally; “if he’s badly wounded it’s his own fault, for meddling in other folks’ affairs.”
One of the men went below. Presently there came a sharp chug-chug, and the anchor being taken in, the sloop began to move off down the creek. As Tubby Hopkins had surmised, she had an engine. Hunt, Jim Dale and Peter Bumpus stood in the bow. Hiram leaned disconsolately against a stay, and Tubby lay at his feet on a coil of rope.
The shores slipped rapidly by, and pretty soon the creek began to widen.
Freeman Hunt was at the wheel, and from time to time Jim Dale shouted directions back at him.
“Port—port! Hard over!” or again, “Hard over! Starboard! There’s a shoal right ahead!”
A moon had risen now, and in the silvery light the darker water of the shoals, of which the creek seemed full, showed plainly.
“This crik’s as full of sand-bars as a hound dorg is uv fleas,” grunted Jim Dale. “It won’t be full tide for two hours or more, either. If——”
There came a sudden, grinding jar.
“Hard over! Hard over!” bellowed Jim Dale.
Freeman Hunt spun the wheel like a squirrel in its cage. But it was too late. The sloop had grounded hard and fast. Leaving Peter Bumpus to guard the boys, Jim Dale and the elder Hunt leaped swiftly aft. They backed the motor, but it was no use. The sloop was too hard aground to be gotten off till the water rose.
“Two hours to wait till the tide rises,” grumbled Jim Dale; “just like the luck.”
Slowly the time passed. But never for an instant was the watch over the boys relaxed. Tubby lay still, and Hiram, almost carried out of himself by the rapid rush of recent events, leaned miserably against the stay.
At last, just as a faint, gray light began to show in the east, they could feel the sloop moving under their feet. With reversed motor, she was backed off the sand-bar, or mud-shoal, and the journey resumed. As the light grew stronger, Hiram saw that they were dropping rapidly down toward the sea. Right ahead of them could now be seen the white foam and spray, where the breakers of the open sea were shattering themselves on the bar at the mouth of the creek.
The channel was narrow and intricate, but Jim Dale, who seemed to be a good pilot, and who had assumed the wheel, brought the sloop through it in safety. Before long, under her keel could be felt the long lift and drive of the open Atlantic.
By gazing at the sun, Hiram saw that the sloop’s head was pointed west. By this he judged that her navigators meant to head down the Long Island shore toward New York.
The sunrise was red and angry. Hiram, with his knowledge of scout-lore, knew that this presaged bad weather. But the crew of the sloop did not seem to notice it. After a while they began to make preparations to hoist sail, as the breeze was freshening.
“Take those kids below,” ordered Stonington Hunt suddenly. Under the escort of Jim Dale, who had relinquished the wheel to Freeman Hunt and Pete Bumpus, the lads—Tubby being carried—were presently installed in a small, dark cabin in the stern of the sloop. This done, the companionway door was closed, and they heard a key grate in a lock. They were prisoners, then, at sea, on this mysterious sloop?
“What next?” groaned Hiram to himself, sinking down on a locker.
“Why, I guess the next thing to do is for me to come to life, my valiant downeaster,” cried Tubby, springing erect from the corner into which he had been thrown. The apparently badly wounded lad seemed as active and chipper as ever.
At the same instant the sloop staggered and heeled over, sending Hiram half across the dingy cabin. He caught at a stanchion and saved himself. Then he turned his amazed gaze afresh on Tubby. The stout youth stood by the companion stairs, regarding him with a grin. Presently he actually began to hum:
“A life on the ocean wave!A home on the rolling deep!
“A life on the ocean wave!
A home on the rolling deep!
“Yo ho, my hearties,” he added, with a nautical twitch at his breeches, “we’re going to have a rough day of it.”
As if in answer, the sloop heeled over to another puff. A tin dish, dislodged from the rusty stove, went clattering across the inclined cabin floor. But still Hiram stood gaping vacantly at Tubby.
“Well, what’s the matter?” inquired that individual cheerfully, “have you lost that voice of yours?”
“No, b-b-b-but I thought you were badly wounded!” Hiram managed to sputter.
“No, b-b-b-but I thought you were badly wounded!” Hiram managed to sputter.“No, b-b-b-but I thought you were badly wounded!” Hiram managed to sputter.
“No, b-b-b-but I thought you were badly wounded!” Hiram managed to sputter.
“So I was, but in reverse English only,” said Tubby cheerfully; “the bullet just nicked me and knocked the breath out of me for a minute. When I came to, I saw that the best thing I could do was to act like Br’er Rabbit and lay low.”
Hiram looked his admiration.
“Wa-al,” he drawled, dropping, as he seldom did even in emotional moments, into his New England dialect, “ef you ain’t ther beatingist!
“But, say,” he added quickly, “what about that red stain on your shirt? Look, it’s all over the front of your uniform.”
“Jiggeree, so it is. I guess that fountain pen of mine must have been busted cold by that bullet. I had it filled with red ink, because I’d been helping Rob fill out some reports to mail to Scout headquarters. Ho! ho!” the fat boy broke into open mirth, “it certainly does look as if some one had tapped my claret. Yo-ho! that was a corker!”
The sloop lurched and dipped deeper than ever. They could see the green water obscure the port hole for an instant.
“That sea’s getting up right along,” said Tubby presently, as he unbound Hiram’s hands. “Say, Hiram,” he added anxiously, “you don’t get seasick easily, do you?”
“N-n-n-no, that is, I don’t think so,” sputtered Hiram rather dubiously.
“Well, don’t, I beg from my heart! Don’t get seasick till we get on land again.”
“I’ll try not to,” said the downeast boy seriously, ignoring the fine “bull” which Tubby’s remark contained.
“Reminds me,” said Tubby presently, “of what the sea captain said to the nervous lady. She went up to him and told him that her husband was scared of getting seasick. ‘My husband’s dreadfully liable to seasickness, captain,’ she said. ‘What must I tell him to do if he feels it coming on?’ ‘You needn’t tell him anything, ma’am,’ said the captain; ‘no need to tell him what to do—he’ll do it.’”
But somehow this bit of humor did not bring even a wan smile to Hiram, willing as he usually was to laugh at Tubby’s whimsical jokes. Instead, he turned a pale face on his companion.
“I—I—do feel pretty bad, for a fact!” he moaned.
“Oh, Jiminy Crickets!” wailed Tubby, “he’s going to be seasick!”
Hiram, with a ghastly face of a greenish-yellow hue, sank down on one of the lockers, resigning himself to his fate. The sloop began to plunge and tumble along in a more lively fashion than ever. Overhead Tubby could hear the trample of feet, as her crew ran about trying to weather the blow.
Suddenly, above the howling of the wind, Tubby heard a sharp click at the companionway door. The next instant the companionway slide was shoved back and a gust of fresh, salt-laden air blew into the close cabin. Stonington Hunt’s form was on the stairway the next moment, and Tubby, with a quick dive, threw himself on the floor in a corner, carrying out once more his rôle of the badly wounded scout.
Lying there, and breathing in a quick, distressed way, Tubby, out of the corner of his eye, watched the man as he moved about. Hunt’s first idea was evidently to rouse Hiram. Perhaps he needed him to help in navigating the storm-buffeted craft. But he soon gave up the task of instilling the seasick lad with ambition or life. Then came Tubby’s turn, but after bending over the fat boy for an instant, Hunt muttered:
“He’s no good,” and without offering to aid the supposedly injured boy, moved away. He ascended the steps and presently the companion slide banged to, and the padlock clicked once more.
Tubby arose, as soon as he was convinced the coast was clear, and, despairing of arousing Hiram, sat on a locker and began to think hard. Rather bitterly he went over in his mind the circumstances leading to their present predicament. In the first place, he could not but own he had had no business to embark on such an enterprise at all without a bigger force. In the second place, if he had lived up to the Scouts’ motto of “Be Prepared,” there was a strong possibility that they would not have been so disastrously precipitated through the roof of the lonely hut. However, before long, Tubby’s naturally buoyant temperament asserted itself. As became a boy who had won a first-class scoutship, he did not waste any further time on vain regrets. Instead of crying over spilled milk, he began to figure on finding a way out of their predicament.
Casting his eyes about the cabin, he suddenly became aware of a small door in the bulkhead at the forward end of it. Curious by nature, Tubby opened it, and peered into a dark, cavernous space. A strong odor of gasoline saluted his nostrils, and presently—his eyes becoming used to the light—he could make out the occasional glint of metal. In a flash he realized that this was the engine-room of the sloop, and housed her auxiliary motor.
A button-switch being made out by the boy at this moment, he turned it. Instantly two incandescent lights shone out, illuminating the place. By their light Tubby made out another door beyond the motor. Determined to investigate the sloop thoroughly—come what might—he thrust it open, and found himself in what seemed to be the hold. But it was too dark to perceive much. Besides, the sloop was pitching and rolling so terribly that the lad had all he could do to hold on.
Returning to the engine-room, he almost stumbled across an electric torch secured to a bracket on the bulkhead. It was evidently used for examining the motor without exposing an open light to the fumes of the gasoline. Armed with this, Tubby once more investigated the hold. It was a capacious place. Stanchions, like a forest of bare trees, supported the deck above. So far as the boy could make out, the place was empty. Far forward was a ladder leading up to a hatchway. Tubby, following out his naturally inquiring bent of mind, was about to examine this, when his heart gave a great bound and then stood still.
He had not thought to cast a glance behind him in his eagerness to examine the hold.
This had proved to be a fatal bit of oversight on his part, for Stonington Hunt and his son, descending to the cabin for some purpose, had observed his absence. A brief investigation showed them the open door into the engine-room and thence they had glimpsed the flash of Tubby’s torch.
The boy turned, warned by some instinct, just as they tiptoed up behind him. Freeman Hunt, with a grin on his face, rushed straight at the Boy Scout. But Tubby was prepared this time, at any rate. He dashed the torch, end down, on the floor of the hold, extinguishing it instantly. At almost the same instant, he rushed straight at the place where he had last seen Freeman Hunt.
To his huge satisfaction, he felt the other go down in a sprawling heap under his onrush. As he fell, Freeman gave a shout of:
“He ain’t wounded at all, dad! He was fooling us!”
“Yes, the brat! He was!” shouted Stonington Hunt, blundering about in the black hold and striving to keep his footing on the pitching, heaving floor.
Tubby, guided by instinct, dashed forward toward the spot, as nearly as he could judge its location, where he had noticed the ladder. He found it, and had placed his foot on the bottom rung, when there was a sudden shock.