"Well, if you are Cap'n Jack Rowan," was his mental reflection, "you are as fine a specimen of a sea-tiger as I ever looked at; an' I wish Tony an' Willis an' that young monkey who brought me into your den was all sunk a hunderd fathoms deep, so I do."
"Here's another and another," exclaimed the man with the lantern, as Roy and Tonycame over the rail. "Is that all of you? Go for'ard and lend a hand."
"Hold hard, sir," said Tony. "I've got a letter for you." And after considerable fumbling in the pocket of his pea-jacket with his hand, Tony drew it out and gave it to the captain, who said "All right," and hurried to his cabin to read it; for the light of the lantern was so dim that he could not even decipher the writing on the envelope.
"A letter for him!" thought Roy. "It's very strange. That looks as though Tony expected to find this ship here, and that he was holding straight for her when he declared he was heading for a hack-stand. But what's the odds? I'd rather have a good ship under me than be out in this wind in a cranky little boat."
Having never been aboard a seagoing vessel before, Roy Sheldon would have taken the deepest interest in all that was going on around him if there had only been light enough for him to see plainly; but he made some observations in spite of the darkness. He found that the deck under his feet seemed to be as solidas the ground; that the waves which had tossed Tony's boat like a chip in a mill-pond had but little effect upon the ship's huge bulk; and he gave it as his private opinion that she was big enough and strong enough to ride out any storm that ever swept the ocean. But there was one thing Roy did not know, and he was two or three hundred miles from New London harbor when he found it out. Strong as she appeared to be, the ship was unseaworthy, her timbers were decayed, and the underwriters wouldn't look at her. The owner was taking his personal risk in sending her abroad with a valuable cargo, and that was one reason why she had found it so hard to ship a crew.
"Lay for'ard an' lend a hand with the head-sails," said Tony, when the man with the lantern disappeared down the companion-way. "Come along, lad, and we'll make a sailor-man of you."
Nothing loth, Roy stumbled forward in Tony's wake, laid hold of a rope when his guide did, and pulled with all his strength, although he had not the slightest idea what heand the rest were pulling for. As often as the flashes of lightning illumined the scene, he improved the opportunity to take a survey of his surroundings; but all he saw was that there was a heavy sail slowly rising over his head, and that there were a goodly number of men on deck, all of whom were working at something. He was so deeply occupied with his own thoughts, wondering how he would feel if he were going to sea on that ship as one of the crew, and be required to scrub decks, tug at wet ropes, go aloft in all sorts of weather, and submit to hard fare and hard treatment besides.—Roy's mind was so busy with these reflections that he did not hear the command, "'Vast heavin'. Slack away on that halliard," nor did he dream that the order was addressed to himself, until the rope, at which he was still pulling with all his might, was jerked from his hands with such force that Roy was sent headlong to the deck. He scrambled to his feet as quickly as he could, but before he reached a perpendicular some enraged sailor gave him a hearty kick.
"I guess they don't want me around,"thought Roy, "and no doubt I am in the way so I'll go aft. Is that the way they use a foremast hand, I wonder—kick him when he falls down through no fault of his own? I am glad I am not a sailor."
When Roy had a chance to look about him, as he did as often as the lightning flashed over the deck, he saw that a good many things had been done during the few minutes that had elapsed since he boarded the vessel. Besides the sailors who were busy with the head-sails, a second party of men, under another officer, had been equally active on the quarter-deck; another huge sail had been given to the breeze, and a man sent to the wheel. The vessel was gathering rapid headway, and, what seemed strange to Roy, she was not rounding to in order to go up the harbor, because the lights which pointed out the position of the piers in the lower end of the city were still on the left hand, and one by one they danced away out of sight over the port quarter. The ship was holding straight for the entrance to the bay, through which she would soon pass to the open sea.
"By gracious! We shall be in a pretty fix if we don't get off immediately," soliloquized Roy, holding fast to the rail and looking in vain for Tony and Bob. "What can those men be thinking of? If they delay much longer I shall cast off in that boat and do the best I can by myself."
"Lay aloft and loose to'gallantsails," shouted a voice, almost in Roy's ear. "Up you go, ye young sea-monkey!"
"I don't belong here," replied Roy, turning about and finding himself face to face with one of the mates, who emphasized his order by waving his arm toward the topsail yard. "But I'll do the best I can if you think you can trust me. How long before you are going to run into the harbor?"
If the mate heard and understood the question he did not take the trouble to reply to it. He simply shouted, "Lay aloft and be quick about it!" and then backed up against the rail so that he could watch the movements of the men who had already responded to the command to loose topgallant-sails.
"I know I'll not be of the least use up there,"said Roy, as he scrambled up the ratlines, "but I'll have something to talk about when I get ashore."
Roy worked his way upward until his progress was stopped by something that frightened him. It was the futtock-shrouds, the terror of every greenhorn. Above his head was a sort of platform, with an opening through it large enough to admit of the passage of an ordinary sized man, and over the edge of it ran a rope ladder to a second series of shrouds leading to a similar platform still higher up. That was the way Roy described the situation to himself, and it is the only way I can describe it, for an Expert Columbia is not supposed to know any thing about ships.
"Great Scott!" panted Roy; "do the sailors, every time they go aloft, have to creep around the outer edge of that platform, and hang with their backs downward, like flies on a ceiling? or do they go through that opening close to the mast? I wonder if that isn't the 'lubber's hole' I have so often read of? I don't care what it is; I'll stay here. But why don't the ship come about and go toward the harbor,if she's going to? I wonder if that light off there, which blazes up so brightly every minute or two and then disappears, isn't on the light-ship. If it is, this ship's going to sea, and we'll go with her if we don't get off directly."
While the boy was talking to himself in this way he did not permit anything that transpired within the range of his vision to escape his notice. He might never again have opportunity to see sail made aboard ship, and now was the time for him to learn something. He heard an almost constant scurrying of feet below, mingled with a chorus of unintelligible commands, some of which were addressed to the dozen or more men who were clinging to a swaying yard over his head, and finally an answering "Ay, ay, sir," came out of the darkness and the men began to "lay down from aloft." Before Roy knew what they meant to do, they were crowding past him on their way to the deck. The last to go by him was Tony.
"What you doin' here, lad?" he exclaimed. "Why didn't you come up higher an' lend a hand with the topsail?"
"The mate or some other officer told me to come, and here I am; although I assured him I wouldn't be of any use," replied Roy. "I was afraid to go any higher. Look here; isn't it about time we were going ashore? I don't believe this ship means to go up the harbor at all."
Tony made some reply under his breath, but Roy did not understand it.
"What's that flash I see every little while off the port bow?" he continued. "It comes from the light-ship which is anchored at the mouth of the harbor, doesn't it? We're going as close to her as we can lie in this wind, and when we pass her we'll be outside, won't we? You had better find out whether or not the captain wants to send any word off in response to the letter you gave him, and then we'll go ashore."
Roy was not a little surprised by the way Tony acted while he was talking to him. He clung to the shrouds with one hand, holding his hat on with the other, all the time uttering the most incomprehensible ejaculations, and glaring wildly around as if he were trying toget his bearings. At last he seemed to recover his power of speech by a mighty effort, and something he said sent a thrill of horror all through Roy Sheldon.
"She's a-goin', easy enough, an', lad, me an' you an' Bob is shanghaied," stammered Tony.
Roy did not grasp the full meaning of the last word. It was the sailor's manner that impressed and frightened him.
CHAPTER IX.
A SWIM IN ROUGH WATER.
"Yes, sir, we're shanghaied," repeated Tony, looking over his shoulder at the lights on shore, which appeared to be moving away from the ship, and going faster and faster as the minutes flew by. "That's what's the matter of me an' you an' Bob. We've been stole from our homes an' friends an' tooken to sea agin our will."
"No!" gasped Roy, who was almost paralyzed by these ominous words. "It can't be possible."
"That's what the matter of us, an' you'll find it so."
"But I'll not go. I don't belong aboard this ship, and the captain has no business to take me to sea against my will."
"Small odds it makes to the likes of him whether he's got any business to do it or not,"answered Tony, who, far from showing the least sign of anger over the outrage of which he was the victim, seemed disposed to accept his fate with as much fortitude as he was able to command. "Where have you lived all your life, that you don't know that that's the way shipmasters sometimes do when they can't raise a crew as fast as they want to? They get men aboard their vessels an' run away with 'em. That's what they are doin' with us."
"But I'll not do duty, I tell you," exclaimed Roy, fairly dazed by the gloomy prospect before him. "I can't, for I am not a sailor. Let's go down and tell the captain to luff and let us off."
"'Twon't do no good," answered Tony, with a sigh of resignation. "He'll only swear at you an' say that the mates will very soon break you in an' larn you your duty. We're in for a long, hard voyage, an' might as well give up all thoughts of gettin' ashore first as last."
"Never!" said Roy, wrathfully. "If there is such a thing—"
"Lay down from aloft!" shouted a voicefrom the deck, following up the command with a volley of oaths and threats that were enough to make a landsman shudder.
"Ay, ay, sir," replied Tony. "Why don't you say the same, lad? You've got to come to it, for it will be worse for you if you don't. There ain't the least use in kickin', for Cap'n Jack has got us hard an' fast."
Roy, who could plainly hear the beating of his heart above the howling of the gale, which seemed to be increasing in fury every moment, followed Tony to the deck, and immediately made his way aft to demand an interview with the captain. He found him easily—at least he found the man who went below with the lantern—and thus addressed him:
"Captain, I thought you were going into the harbor for shelter, but I find you are going to sea. Will you luff long enough to let me and my crew get into our boat and shove off?"
To Roy's surprise and indignation the captain did not appear to be listening to him at all. He kept his gaze fastened upon something ahead of the ship, and now and then turned to give an order to the man at the wheel. If Royhad only known it, he was forcing himself upon the captain's notice at a most critical time. The latter was trying to take his vessel out of the bay without the aid of a pilot, and of course his attention was so fully occupied that he had neither the leisure nor the inclination to listen to any requests or complaints.
"Starboard a spoke or two. Steady at that. Mr. Crawford," shouted the captain, addressing one of his mates, "if that man with the lead can't speak so that I can hear him, knock him overboard and put somebody else in his place. How close to the light-ship can I run in this tide?"
"If you don't run in closer than you are now you'll be aground in a minute more," was the reply that was shouted aft. "Quarter less three on the port bow."
Roy paid little attention to this conversation, though he thought of it afterward, for it was a most fortunate thing for him that the vessel was obliged to run within a stone's throw of the light-ship. He wanted the skipper to speak to him.
"Captain," said he in a louder tone, at the same time drawing a step nearer and taking the unwarrantable liberty to pluck him by the coat-sleeve. "Captain, will you please—"
"What do you want here?" thundered the angry skipper, kicking at the boy with his heavy boot. But the words, which came just a second or two before the kick, served as a warning of what might be expected, and when the captain's boot got where he had been, Roy wasn't there. He dodged out of the way very cleverly, and raised his voice in useless remonstrance.
"Do you know who you are kicking at?" he exclaimed. "I am not one of your crew to be driven about in this fashion. I came aboard under a misapprehension, and want to go ashore. My boat is alongside."
What the skipper would have said or done if it had not been for something that happened just then, I don't pretend to know. Beyond a doubt he would have made the free-spoken Roy sup sorrow with a big spoon, if Tony and Bob had not unwittingly created a diversion in his favor. When they saw Roy standing so nearthe captain they took heart, and came aft to say a word for themselves, but repented of it when the enraged skipper undertook to drive the boy forward with a kick. But then it was too late for them to escape punishment for their assurance in venturing into the captain's presence without being asked. One of the mates saw them when they went aft, and made it his business to follow them with a piece of rope in his hand. Roy saw him swing it in the air and knew what he meant to do with it; but before he had time to shout a warning to the men for whose backs it was intended, the rope fell twice in quick succession, and with such force that Tony and Bob staggered under the blows.
"Lay for'ard, where you belong, and come on the quarter-deck when you've got business here," shouted the mate. He raised the rope to give emphasis to his order, but the two men hurried out of his reach. Then the mate looked at Roy.
"Give him a dose, too, Mr. Crawford," said the captain. "He's no right to come here bothering me at this juncture. You mightas well teach him his place one time as another."
Roy opened his lips to protest against such an outrage, but seeing the mate advancing upon him, he turned and took to his heels. In half a minute more he was hauling at a rope in company with somebody whom he took to be Tony; but it proved to be a sailor who was posted in regard to the vessel and her contemplated movements.
"What ship is this?" whispered Roy, trying hard to swallow a big lump that seemed to be rising in his throat.
"The White Squall," was the answer.
"Is she going to sea?"
The sailor prepared to give a profane response to the question, which was so simple that a blind boy ought to have been able to answer it for himself, but when he came to look at Roy he hesitated, and choked back the words that arose to his lips.
"Yes, she's bound out, and you haven't any call to go with her, have you?" said he. "It's a hard case, but I don't see what you can do about it."
"Isn't there any law to punish a captain for taking men to sea against their will?" asked Roy.
"Not on the high seas," was the reply. "The only law there is outside is the cap'n's will. How come you aboard here in the first place?"
Roy explained the situation as briefly as he could, whereupon the sailor laughed incredulously.
"That crew of your'n must be into the plot," said he.
"What plot?" inquired Roy.
"Why, isn't there somebody ashore who don't want you there, and who would be glad to have you carried so far away that you would never get back again?"
"Of course there isn't," said Roy, amazed at the idea.
"Then it's mighty strange," continued the sailor, reflectively. "The wind don't blow to hurt anything, and that crew of your'n could have taken you to the city if they had been so minded."
"You're mistaken there. They dared notturn about for fear our boat would be capsized. It isn't likely that they would have come aboard this ship if they had known that they were going to be kidnapped, would they?"
"Aha!" exclaimed the sailor. "So they have been shanghaied too, have they? Then I can't understand the matter at all. No, they wouldn't have come here if they had known that, for I have heard that the cap'n is one of the worst brutes that any poor chap ever sailed under."
"Then why do you sail with him? Were you shanghaied, too?"
"Oh no; I was shipped all straight enough, but, bless you, I never knew what sort of a craft I was getting onto till it was too late to back out. But I never expect to reach Canton alive."
"Canton?" cried Roy. "Is that where this ship is bound?"
"It's the port the old man intends to bring up in if he can keep afloat that long. Being as I'm here, I'm going to do an able seaman's duty as long as I am on top of water. Yousay you came off in a boat. Where is she now?"
Roy replied that she was towing alongside.
"Well, look here," said the sailor hastily. "Do you see that flash ahead? It comes from the light-ship. If you know when you are well off, you will jump into that boat of your'n and pull for that light the best you know how. It's your only chance, for I don't believe this old tub will ever see port again."
"So I can," said Roy joyfully. "Will you go with me? and I can tip Tony and Bob the wink and have them go too?"
"Not by no means," said the sailor, as if the idea of such a thing was enough to frighten him. "Take care of yourself, and let the rest do the same. Are you going to try it?" he added, when Roy let go his hold upon the rope and looked around to see what had become of the mate. "Then make a sure thing of it the first time trying. Don't allow yourself to be brought back, for if you do you'll wish you had never been born. You'd better sink right here in the harbor than trust yourself to thisship and her officers. It don't matter about me, for I am used to hard knocks."
The sailor's earnest words frightened Roy, but did not deter him from carrying out the bold plan he had suddenly formed in his mind. Casting his eye around the deck to make sure that the mate with the rope's end was nowhere in sight, he moved swiftly along the weather rail, until he thought he saw a chance to dart over to the other side without being seen. He crossed the deck with a few quick steps and looked over into the water. There was the boat, still right side up, and her painter was within easy reach of his hand. More than that, as if to encourage him in his desperate resolve, the flash from the light-ship, now close aboard, burst through the gloom, and showed him everything as plainly as though it had been broad daylight. The dark waves with their white caps looked very threatening, but so did the prospect he had before him of making a long voyage under brutal officers and in an unseaworthy vessel.
"It's now or never," thought Roy, shutting his teeth hard and calling all his courage tohis aid. "In five minutes more that light-ship will be so far out of reach—"
Just then something took him full in the eye, and Roy, who had bent over while working at the boat's painter, straightened up with a jerk, and flopped down upon his back. Scarcely realizing what had happened to him, the boy scrambled to his feet only to receive a blow in the other eye, and to hear the mate shout at him, in tones of suppressed fury:
"Going to desert, were you? I expected it, and have had my gaze fastened on you all along. Take that and that, and see if it will do you until I can get a better chance at you."
Did the enraged officer intend to kill him where he lay? Roy wondered, as he raised his arm to ward off the heavy blows from the rope's end that were aimed at his head. It is quite possible that the brute would have disabled him had not the captain, who had witnessed the whole proceeding, called out:
"Cast the boat adrift, Mr. Crawford. That will put an end to all such nonsense."
The officer turned to obey the order, and in an instant Roy was on his feet. At the sameinstant, too, the sailor's warning words came into his mind like an inspiration: "Don't allow yourself to be brought back, for if you do you will wish you had never been born. You'd better sink right here in the harbor than trust yourself to this ship and her officers," and something the mate said while he was striking at him with the rope's end satisfied Roy that there was more punishment of some sort coming as soon as the officer could find time to administer it.
"Another such a beating as that would lay me up sure," thought Roy, drawing his hand across his face and looking around to see where he was. "I can't stand it and I won't."
Roy sprang away from the rail, but quick as the action was, the movement the vigilant officer made to defeat it was almost as quick. His brawny hand shot out like a flash, and by the merest chance missed a hold upon Roy's arm. His strong fingers fastened into the boy's shirt-sleeve, and during the brief but furious struggle that followed either the stitches or cloth gave away. At any rate when the mate straightened up he was holding thesleeve of Roy's shirt in his grasp, and Roy himself, having cleared the deck in two or three jumps, was standing upon the lee rail.
"Come back here, you villain," roared the mate, starting forward, "or I'll haze you till you'll be glad to go overboard in mid-ocean."
But the boy preferred to go overboard in the harbor, where he stood a chance—a bare chance—of rescue. He did not see the pilot-boat that dashed by just then, but he saw the light-ship riding at her anchorage a short distance away, and without pausing to take another look at the angry waters, for fear that the sight of them would be too much for his courage, he sprang into the air. The mate reached the side just a minute too late. The deserter was well out of his way.
"That's the end of him, sir," said he, turning to the captain.
"Let the pilot-boat take care of him," said the latter gruffly. "I can't stop to bother with him."
This was all that was said aboard the White Squall, and nothing whatever was done to aid the deserter; but the pilot-boat officers hadmore humanity. As soon as their vessel could be thrown up into the wind a boat was put into the water, and for half an hour or more the crew pulled about in various directions, looking for Roy, who was swimming for the light-ship with slow and easy strokes. He was by all odds the best swimmer in Mount Airy, and his skill and long wind stood him well in hand now. He was badly frightened at first when the waves broke over his head and bore him under, but he always came to the surface in time to catch the next one, which not only carried him rapidly toward his haven of refuge, but kept him afloat long enough to get his breath and fill his lungs for the next plunge.
Roy afterward said that that long swim in rough water was more like a dream than a reality. When he found that he had no trouble in keeping on top of the water long enough to breathe fully and freely, but two ideas filled his mind. One was to reach the light-ship before his strength gave out; the second to lose no time, after he got ashore, in doing something for Bob and Tony who were being carried awayin that unseaworthy ship. He was afterwards sorry that he wasted so much sympathy upon them.
About the time the pilot-boat's crew began to despair of picking up the deserter, and filled away to the city to tell the story of his "deliberate suicide" to eager reporters, who published it in their papers the next morning, and Roy was becoming weary of buffeting the waves, the swim was ended and help speedily came. A friendly billow threw him against one of the swaying hawsers that kept the light-ship in place, and the boy held fast to it.
"Boat ahoy!" yelled Roy, with all the strength of his lungs.
An instant later the sagging of the cable soused him under; but the wind caught up his voice and carried it across the intervening space to the deck of the light-ship, and when Roy came up again he saw a couple of tarpaulins above her rail, and as many lanterns hanging over the side.
"Where away?" shouted a voice, that somewhat resembled the deep bass of a fog-horn.
"Here I am; holding fast to the anchor rope," replied Roy. "Can't you see me now?"
The boy's hand instinctively went to his head; but the cap he intended to wave in the air to show the light-ship's men where he was, had been left aboard the White Squall to keep company with his shirt-sleeve. But if the men couldn't see him they heard his words, for the wind brought them plainly to their ears; and instead of stopping to ask him what he was doing in the water and how he got there in the first place, they pulled up their lanterns and hurried away.
"Hurrah for me!" said Roy to himself. "They've gone to lower a boat and I am all right—"
Just then another wave broke over his head; but when he came up again, Roy continued his soliloquy as if nothing had happened.
"Or shall be in a few minutes," said he. "I've learned a good many things to-night, and one of them is, that a wind that would keep our Mount Airy people ashore don't bother these deep-water fellows at all. I callthis a gale; but these watermen, who are used to such things, run around in small boats as fearlessly as we take to Mirror Lake when there isn't a capful of wind to ruffle the surface."
Roy was plunged under a good many times while he waited for the men to come and take him off, but presently their boat hove in sight. She looked too large and heavy for two men to row, but she was built for just the work she was doing now, and Roy Sheldon was not the only one who owed his life to her and the gallant fellows who manned her. She came over the waves like a duck, and almost before Roy knew it he was sitting in her stern-sheets with a heavy coat around him. The men uttered exclamations of astonishment when they saw how he was dressed, but not a question did they ask until they had taken him safe aboard the light-ship and into a warm, well-lighted cabin.
"Pull off them wet duds and put on these here," said one of the men, laying some dry clothing on a chair near the stove.
"I am sorry to occasion you so muchtrouble," began Roy, who saw that the oil-skin suits his rescuers wore were dripping with spray. "I have given you a long, hard pull."
"Oh, that's nothing," was the reply. "We're used to picking up folks, specially during the racing season when a yacht turns bottom side up now and then. But what made you get sick of your bargain so soon? Why didn't you let yourself go down, like you'd oughter?"
"What bargain?" exclaimed Roy. "And why ought I to let myself go down?"
"Why, you jumped off that there ship on purpose, 'cause me and my pardner seen you when you done it. We've been kinder looking for you ever since. We didn't go out after you, 'cause number 29's boat struck the water most as soon as you did."
"Who bunged your eyes for you?" asked the man who had not spoken before, and who was getting ready to give Roy a pot of hot coffee.
"Are they black?" said the boy angrily.
He glanced around the cabin, and seeing a small mirror fastened against the bulkhead onthe other side, he walked over and looked into it. Yes, his eyes were black.
"The ship I deserted from was the White Squall," said Roy; whereupon the light-ship men nodded, as much as to say that the whole matter had been made clear to them. "I didn't belong to her. I was—what do you call it?—shanghaied? Yes; that was what was done to me, and also to the two men who started to row me from Shelly's Island to New London. One of the sailors told me I had better get off if I could see half a chance, and that was the way I came to be in the water. One of the mates knocked me down twice while I was working at the painter of our boat, and pounded me with a piece of rope till—well, look at that," added Roy, who, when he came to pull off his wet shirt, found that he could not do it without assistance. His arm pained him, and he could not use it as readily as usual. This led him to make an examination, and he found that the arm was bruised and discolored from shoulder to elbow.
"Yas," remarked one of the men, as if hewere speaking of an every-day occurrence, "I've seen a good many such whacks in my time."
"Do all officers pound their men in this fashion, and do you fellows submit to it?" cried Roy, in great surprise. "Well, I won't, I bet you. I'll have those two men arrested; the captain for kidnapping me, and the mate for using me up in this way."
"Drink this coffee and tell us when you're going to do all that," said one of the men.
"Yas," said the other. "And while I am helping you rub them bruises with this arnica, tell us how you're going to do it."
"When and how?" repeated Roy, as he submitted to the old sea-dog's rough but kindly administrations.
"Yas. You can't get ashore before morning, and by that time the White Squall will be miles and miles at sea. It'll be two years, mebbe three, before she makes this port again, and like as not there won't be a single man in her crew that she took away with her. Then where'll your witnesses be to prove that youwas shanghaied, and that the mate knocked you down and beat you with a rope's end?"
Roy backed toward the nearest bunk, sat down upon it and took a long and hearty drink of the hot coffee before he made any reply. He had comforted himself with the mental assurance that it would be an easy matter for him to bring the master of the White Squall to justice, but now he discovered that there were difficulties in the way.
"Law ain't made for the poor chaps that sail the high seas, but for landsmen," said the one who gave him the coffee. "Sailor-men ain't got no use for it, for nobody cares for them. I've heard enough about that ship and her cap'n to know that I shouldn't like to sail on her, and I tell you that you was mighty lucky to get away with a whole skin. The mate knocked you over while you was trying to cast off your boat; then what happened?"
"I made a dash for the other side of the ship and went overboard," answered Roy. "The mate made a grab for me, and besides tearing the sleeve out of my shirt he must have given my arm an awful wrench, for I can hardly liftthat pot of coffee with it. There isn't any danger that she will stop and take me off this boat, is there?"
The light-ship men chuckled and winked at each other as though they thought Roy had said something amusing.
"Bless your simple heart! She's hull down before this time," one of them remarked. "You don't think that a ship that has been loaded and waiting for two or three weeks would stop to pick up a deserter, do you? and him a landsman that don't know one side of the deck from t'other? You'll never see the White Squall again less'n you stay here and look for her. What sort of clothes is them, any way, that you just took off? Looks something like a rowing rig, but 'tain't."
Roy replied that it was a bicycle uniform, and then went on to tell his story, hoping that the mention of Rowe Shelly's name might lead the men to give him some information concerning the runaway. They lived but a short distance from his island home, and Roy thought it possible they might know him; but he very soon became satisfied that they didn't. Theyheld little communication with the people on the neighboring islands, all their supplies, as well as the limited number of papers they read, being received from the mainland, and they did not act as though they had ever heard of Rowe Shelly before; but they showed Roy very plainly that there were some portions of his narrative they found it hard to believe. One of them turned on his heel with the remark that the wind didn't "blow to do any hurt," that there was no need of anybody "going aboard a ship for shelter on such a night" as that one was, and went on deck to see how things were going there; while the other, with the suspicion of a smile about his mouth, said to Roy:
"You're getting kinder white around the gills. Hadn't you better lay down in that there bunk before it gets worse on you? That's my advice."
"I do feel rather queer, that's a fact," answered the boy. "I suppose the pounding and swim together were too much for me."
"Yas; I reckon they were. But you'll be all right after a while."
The man followed his companion to the deck, and Roy lay down upon the bunk; but very gradually a suspicion crept into his mind that the beating he had received and his long swim in rough water had little to do with his miserable feelings.
"I am sea-sick," groaned Roy. "That's what's the matter with me. Being shut up in this warm, close cabin has done the business for me."
The boy made a shrewd guess. Many a long hour dragged its weary length away before he was "all right" again.
CHAPTER X.
THE BOY WHO WOULDN'T BE "PUMPED."
Allthe rest of the night Roy Sheldon, who was ill indeed, rolled and tossed in his bunk without once closing his eyes in sleep. At first he was very much afraid that the light-ship would go down, she pitched so furiously; and as his malady grew upon him, he wished from the bottom of his heart that she would spring a leak and sink, and so put him out of his misery. To make matters worse, his rescuers never came near to sympathize with him, or ask if there was anything they could do to relieve him. They left him to fight the battle alone, and their neglect made Roy so indignant that he resolved he would not speak to them again, not even to thank them for the important service they had rendered him. Shortly after daylight, however, he fell into a refreshing slumber, and when he awoketwo hours later his sickness was all gone, and he was as hungry as a wolf.
"Well, my hearty," was the cordial way in which he was greeted when he rolled out of his bunk, "you don't look quite as blue about the gills as you did when you turned in. Feel any better? Set down and take another pot of coffee."
"Thank you. I feel a good deal more like myself," was Roy's reply. "I can't begin to tell you how grateful I am to you, or how glad I am that I went overboard when I did, and that I succeeded in laying hold of that anchor-rope before my wind and strength gave out. I was getting tired, I tell you. If I were aboard that ship now how far at sea would I be?"
"A hundred miles, or such a matter, in this wind, and with a fair chance of seeing furrin countries before you come back."
"I would have stood a better chance of becoming food for the sharks, if all I heard about her is true," said Roy, as he seated himself at one end of the mess-chest which served as a table. "The sailor who advised me to desert said he never expected to reach Cantonalive. Now, how soon can I get ashore to relieve the anxiety of my friends?"
That was a matter that was settled with half a dozen words. He was given to understand that he would be carried over to the nearest pier as soon as he had eaten his breakfast; and his mind being set at rest, he ate a hearty one. When he thanked the men for their kindness they laughed and said "that was all right," and showed some curiosity to know why Roy was so careful to take their names and address.
"I like to keep track of my acquaintances," said the boy; "I may want to call upon you at some future time, and if I do, I shall know where to find you."
Breakfast being over, Roy, who had put on his own clothes when he left his bunk, climbed into the boat and was pulled ashore. There was a hack-stand near the pier on which he was landed, and although Roy did not know it at the time, Tony and Bob could have put him ashore there the night before if the instructions they received from Colonel Shelly's superintendent had not led them to follow a differentcourse. Being anxious to escape observation Roy took a hurried leave of the light-ship's men, hastened toward the hack-stand, and dived into the first carriage he came to.
"Pull up the windows, put down the curtains so that no one can see me, and go for the Lafayette House at your very best licks," said Roy to the astonished driver, who looked critically at the boy's sleeveless shirt and bandaged eye, and seemed in no particular hurry to obey.
"Been in a fight?" said he.
"Yes; been in half a dozen. Whipped more than forty men, and swam in from a hundred miles out at sea," replied Roy, impatiently. "I've money in my pocket and more at the hotel, if that is what you want to know. Hurry up, and I will give you double fare."
That was something the hackman could understand. Looking curiously at his passenger the while he hastened to obey his orders, and in a few seconds had made the carriage as close as an oven. But Roy did not care for that. He settled back in the corner, and wonderedwhat Arthur and Joe would say when he walked into their presence.
"I know I am a nice looking object," was his mental reflection, "but I should like to see either one of those fellows go through what I did and come out in better shape. I tell you I have had a narrow escape, and Rowe Shelly, whoever he may be, can thank his lucky stars that he was not in my place. I can't do anything for Bob and Tony, but I can bear those light-ship men in mind, and I will too."
With the prospect of a double fare before him the hackman drove as rapidly as he dared, and when he drew rein in front of the hotel to which he had been directed, Roy threw open the door and jumped out, crossed the wide sidewalk with a few swift steps, and sought concealment behind one of the front doors, every move he made being closely followed by the driver, who wanted to make sure of his money before he let his strange passenger out of sight. Then came that hurried interview with the hotel clerk, who could hardly be made to believe that Roy Sheldon was not Robert Barton, after which the new-comerwent to his room to change his clothes and send the porter out for a new helmet to take the place of the one he had left on board the White Squall.
"There," said Roy, as he stood before the mirror and tied a clean handkerchief over his left eye, "that looks a little more respectable, but not much. I must have a pretty hard head or that mate would have knocked me senseless. Suppose he had, and that I had been kicked out of the way or carried down into the forecastle, and never come to myself until this morning! I'd been a hundred miles or more at sea, and in a rotten old ship that is liable to go to pieces in the very first storm she encounters. It makes me shudder to think of it."
Having fixed himself up as well as he could, Roy went downstairs and into the reading-room to wait for Joe and Arthur to "show up." At the same time a sharp-looking gentleman, whose eyes were everywhere at once, walked briskly up to the clerk's desk and leaned upon it.
"What do you know?" said he. "I mustmake out a column some way or other, and if you don't help me out, I shall always think you ought to."
"I don't know a thing," replied the clerk. "Go into the reading-room and pump that fellow with the bunged-up eye. He's a wheelman from Mount Airy. Came in yesterday with two others, and got into trouble before he had fairly eaten his supper. That's his name right there," added the clerk, as the sharp-looking man, who was a newspaper reporter, pulled a note-book from his pocket and wrote something in it in short-hand. "He just as good as told me that he was mistaken for Rowe Shelly, kidnapped and taken over to the island, and barely escaped being carried to sea."
"On what vessel?" exclaimed the reporter, showing some excitement and no little interest.
"Don't know. Didn't think to ask him, for he was in a great hurry to go to his room."
"So Rowe Shelly has skipped again, has he?" said the reporter. "That won't do me any good, for Shelly owns some of our stock and we can't dip into his private affairs.Don't tell anybody else of it, there's a good fellow, for I want to get a scoop on this whole business. Did this what's his name—Sheldon, look as though he had been in the water?"
"Come to think of it, he did. His uniform was shrunk and mussed, one sleeve of his shirt was missing, and both his eyes were blacked. At least one was, for I saw it. He kept the other covered up."
"I'll bet it's the same chap. Haven't you seen this morning'sTribune? Well, there's an article in it, with the blackest kind of headlines, entitled, 'Mutiny in the Harbor. A Sailor prefers Death to a Voyage in the White Squall,' and so forth and so on,et cetera. One of our fellows wrote that up, and now you just watch me get the sequel. Hoop-la! My column's safe. How'll I know him—by his bunged-up eyes?"
"Look right through the door. That's him, with the blue uniform on and a paper in his hand. But hold on a minute," said the clerk, as the reporter turned away. "If you mean to get anything out of him you'll have to be sly about it, for he says he won't be pumped."
"Oh, won't he? We'll see about that."
Roy Sheldon, who was deeply interested in that article in theTribune, and congratulating himself on the fact that his name was not mentioned in it, and that consequently his father and mother would never hear of his adventure until he was ready to tell them about it, did not so much as raise his eyes when the reporter came in and sat down near him. He went on with his reading until he heard a pleasant voice say:
"Good morning, Mr. Sheldon. You have had a pretty rough experience, have you not?"
If the chair in which he was sitting had suddenly given away and let him down on the floor, Roy would not have been half as much astonished as he was when he heard himself addressed in this way by a man whom he had never seen before. He looked at him over the top of his paper, and then drew his head down behind it; whereupon the reporter pulled out his handkerchief and mopped his face to conceal the smile that came to his lips.
"Of course you don't mind what those light-ship men said tome," he continued.
"Oh! did they tell you about it?" exclaimed Roy, and that was all the reporter wanted to show him that he was on the right track. Being shrewd and experienced in his profession, he had already made up his mind just what that 'sequel' was going to be. The sailor, who was seen by the captain of pilot-boat number twenty-nine to jump into the harbor, was not a seafaring man, but a wheelman. He had succeeded in reaching the light-ship, whose crew rescued him, brought him ashore in the morning, and here he was. Roy had told the clerk he would not be interviewed; but that did not worry the reporter.
"Yes; I have heard all about it," said he. "You see, I am the fellow who supplies those light-ship men with some of their reading-matter."
"Oh," said Roy again, "I was afraid you might be a reporter."
"My dear sir, do I look as if I were that low down in the world? What's the reason you don't want to see any news-gatherers? You have been the hero of an adventure, and most boys would like to see it in print."
"It's in print already, but fortunately the man who wrote about it did not know my name," replied Roy. "There's a long account of it in theTribune?"
"And is that account correct?"
"Perfectly. But my father takes theTribune, and if he had seen my name in that article he would have ordered me home in short order."
"And you don't want to go, I suppose?"
"Certainly not," answered Roy, who then went on to tell where hedidwant to go; and to prove that his father would be likely to tell him to come home if he got into trouble, he related what Mr. Wayring had done when he learned through the New London papers that Matt Coyle had tied Joe to a tree and threatened to beat him with switches.
"I remember of reading about that," said the reporter. "One of theTribune'sstaff was stopping at the Sportsman's Home at the time, and he was the one who wrote it up. I don't blame you for not wanting your name mentioned in connection with that little episode in the harbor last night, and you are wise inkeeping your weather eye open for reporters. That's the only one you can keep open, isn't it? Who shut up the other one for you?"
It was by such ingenious and apparently disinterested questions as these, that the reporter gradually led Roy Sheldon on to tell his story from beginning to end. He was really astonished when the boy brought his narrative to a close, and told himself that he was master of some secrets that would eventually bring Colonel Shelly and his superintendent into trouble, and the runaway Rowe into his rights. More than one reporter has run to earth criminals whom the best detectives could not track, and Roy's visitor suddenly resolved that he would do a little in that line himself. He would have given something handsome to know where Rowe was at that minute and what he intended to do; but Roy could not enlighten him. On the other hand, he asked the reporter to tell him what he knew about Rowe himself.
"That boy is well fixed over there on the island," said he. "Everybody is kind to him, he has everything money can buy, and hewouldn't run away unless there was good cause for it," said Roy. "I wasn't on the island long enough to learn much about him; can't you tell me something?"
"I am sorry to say I can't," said the reporter, as he arose from his chair. "I have never been on the island, and don't know the first thing about Rowe Shelly and his family relations, except what I have heard in a roundabout way. Look here," he added, sinking his voice almost to a whisper; "do you see those three fellows talking with the clerk? Look out for them. They are reporters for evening papers. Tell 'em you're busy—that your eyes are so black you can't talk to 'em—tell 'em anything you can think of, for if you don't, they will have you in print sure pop. So-long, and a pleasant trip if I don't see you again before you leave the city."
So saying the reporter winked at Roy, and hurried away to write up the "sequel" for the evening edition of his paper, while Roy hid behind his copy of theTribune. The three men against whom he had been warned came in at last, but if they wanted information theydid not get much. Roy was very unsociable, and they finally departed with the conviction that theTribune'sman had been too sharp for them this time.
Roy's next visitor was Willis, and the next two were Joe Wayring and Arthur Hastings, who would scarcely have recognized him if it had not been for his uniform. They listened in great amazement to his story, which I afterward heard just as I have tried to tell it, and never once said a word to interrupt him. Arthur's indignation was almost unbounded; while the clear-sighted Joe saw two or three things in the narrative which proved to his satisfaction that Roy's visit to the White Squall was not purely accidental. But the trouble was, Roy himself did not think so, and he had not really said anything that was calculated to throw suspicion upon the superintendent. It was plain, however, that Willis was afraid he might say something, for as soon as Roy's story was finished he got upon his feet and put on his hat.
"As you remarked a little while ago, 'all's well that ends well,'" said he. "I amheartily glad you got safely out of that scrape, Mr. Sheldon, and hope you will speedily recover from the effects of your treatment at the hands of that brutal mate. I wish he might be punished for it; but it is just as those men on the light-ship told you. The White Squall will not return for two or three years, and by that time the men who now comprise her crew may be scattered to the ends of the globe. I wish you good-morning, and a pleasant run across the State."
So saying, Willis bowed himself out of the reading-room, and Babcock went with him, leaving the three friends alone.
"Say, old fellow," exclaimed Joe, settling back in his chair and looking at Roy, "you've more pluck than I ever gave you credit for, but not half as much mother-wit."
"What has gone wrong with you now?" asked Roy, in reply.
"Nothing whatever; but if you don't find that something has gone wrong with you, I shall miss my guess. And you are the boy who wouldn't be pumped, are you? Well, you are a good one."
"I tell you I didn't give those three reporters the first grain of information," said Roy, bridling up.
"No; but you gave the first one who gained your ear all the information he wanted. That fellow who came his Oily Gammon over you and told you that he supplied the light-ship's crew with a portion of their reading matter, was a reporter. He'll have the whole thing in his paper to night, and you will have to go home."
"And that means all of us," added Arthur.
"No!" gasped Roy, alarmed by the thought. "Let's get away from the city without an hour's delay. If we do that, we can prolong our run as far as Bloomingdale; for you know that was the first place at which we were to stop for letters."
"But you can't ride," said Joe.
"What's the reason I can't?" inquired Roy. "I know my arm is almost useless, but my legs are all right, as I will show you when we are fairly on the road again. Say, fellows, let's make the pace hot enough to reach Bloomingdale and get beyond it before any return orders can catch us."
"Why not avoid the place altogether?" suggested Arthur. "Have you had your arm examined by a surgeon?"
Roy said he hadn't thought of it, and Arthur continued: "Then we'll have it done at once. If he says you can ride, we'll take to the road at once. If he says you can't, that settles it."
Great was their relief when the medical man, to whom they were directed, told Roy that, although he had received a pretty severe fall (he thought Roy had taken a header and the latter was quite willing to have it so), he would be able to continue the run provided he could manage his wheel with one hand, and would promise not to run too fast.
"But," added the doctor, "it's a little the queerest hurt I ever saw from a header. I don't quite see how you managed to black both your eyes and injure your arm in one fall. If you had been in a fight with the canalers I could understand it. You mustn't think of going on for at least two or three days. Lie still to-morrow and next day, take a short run on Saturday, stop over somewhere in thecountry on Sunday, and make a fresh start on Monday."
When the boys heard this their countenances fell; but, as Arthur had said, "that settled it." All they could do was to make themselves miserable for the rest of the day and the whole of the two succeeding ones. They could not even visit their friends in the city, for if they did, every one would want to know where Roy Sheldon was, and why he didn't show himself.
"I'm a pretty looking fellow to go calling, am I not?" said the latter dolefully. "It can't be done, boys. I'd have to tell the truth, and I might as well go home at once as to do that. I'm going to hug my room the best I know how, and you'll have to see that I don't starve; for now that I have found you, I am not going to exhibit myself in that reading-room again. Now, come up-stairs and tell me all you know about Rowe Shelly."
The story his friends had to tell was not near as long as his own, but it was fully as interesting. It required but a few words from them to make everything clear to Roy's comprehension. The man who claimed to be Colonel Shelly and Rowe's guardian was a fraud, the boy's parents were still living, and he was determined to find them in spite of all the obstacles that could be thrown in his way. That was all there was of it.
"I hope from the bottom of my heart that he will succeed," said Roy earnestly. "When I was in the water swimming for the light-ship, I felt bitter toward everybody; but now that I have come safely out of the worst scrape I ever was in, I don't feel so. The clerk, who evidently knows a little about Rowe and his affairs, declared that he was a fool for running away, but somehow I couldn't believe it. Now I know he isn't. If one of us was in his place they'd have to put guards all around that island to keep him there."
"How far was it from the White Squall to the light-ship?"
"About twice as far as Mirror Lake is wide. The swim wasn't anything to be afraid of, but the rough water—"
"And the sharks," interposed Arthur.
"By gracious!" exclaimed Roy, jumpingup from the bed on which he had but a moment before laid himself down. "I never thought of sharks, and I'm glad I didn't. It would have made a coward of me sure, and I was near enough to that as it was. But they do have them around that light-ship, don't they? I have seen the fact stated in the papers before now. It took all the pluck I had to face the waves, and if I had thought of sharks I don't believe you ever would have seen me again."
"Rowe wouldn't have had the courage to do what you did," observed Arthur.
"I don't think he would," said Joe. "But then he never would have been called upon to do it, for that man Willis would not have sent him aboard the White Squall to be carried to sea."
"You don't think Willis got Tony and Bob and me shanghaied on purpose, do you?" exclaimed Roy, who had not dreamed of such a thing. "You are surely mistaken. I saw those men driven to duty with a piece of rope."
"I don't say they knew they were going to be kidnapped when they took you aboard thatvessel, but that it was a part of the superintendent's plan for getting rid of the whole of you," replied Joe, who then went on to tell why he thought so. Three different sailor men with whom Roy had conversed assured him that the wind didn't blow to hurt anything, that there was no need that anybody in a small boat should seek shelter on a vessel on such a night as last night was, and if Roy could not see that that proved something, he was by no means as bright as Joe thought he was.
"I can see it now," said Roy. "If I could only bring it home to him wouldn't I—"
"No doubt you would: but there's the trouble. You can't prove anything. I am sorry you let that reporter bamboozle you into telling him all about your adventure. The fellows he told you to look out for were on rival papers, and it was his business to keep them from getting any information out of you if he could. I wish the evening papers were out."
The others wished so too, but four long hours passed before the voice of the newsboy was heard in the street, and then Arthur made a rush for the door. When he returned he hada copy of all the evening papers on sale, but theTribunewas the only one Roy cared to see, and it was promptly passed over to him.
"Here it is in black and white," he groaned, almost as soon as he opened the sheet. "'A Plucky Wheelman. Something that might have been a Tragedy. The Truth about it.' Read it out and then go and pound that reporter."
Arthur complied with many misgivings, but as he read he often paused to look at his chums, who stared at him and at each other in turn. Everything that happened on board the White Squall was truthfully described, the brutality of the ship's officers was denounced in no measured terms, Roy's short but desperate struggle with the mate was told in graphic language, but the only ones whose real names were mentioned were the two light-ship men, Captain Jack Rowan and the scoundrel Crawford. Roy Sheldon was called Peter Smith without a word of excuse or apology, while Rowe Shelly, his guardian, and Willis, the superintendent, were not spoken of at all. The boys could not understand it; but then they did not knowthat Rowe's guardian was part owner of theTribuneand had influence enough to cause the discharge of any man on it who did not write to suit him. As soon as Arthur finished the article they all went to work to examine the other papers; but there was nothing in them about the "Plucky Wheelman." TheTribunehad a "scoop" on all its competitors.
"That bangs me," said Roy, at length.
"It suits you, does it not?"
"Perfectly. It's better than I thought it could be. Of course our folks will read it, but they'll never dream that one of us had anything to do with it. That reporter is a brick. You needn't mind pounding him, boys."
"Thank you," said Joe, drily. "I had no intention of trying anything of the kind. I have heard of fellows going out to thrash newspaper men and coming home on a shutter. It might have been so in this case."
Arthur Hasting voiced the sentiments of his companions when he said he felt as if a big load had been taken off his shoulders. Their run wasn't "blocked" after all.
CHAPTER XI.
ON THE ROAD AGAIN.
AlthoughRoy Sheldon and his friends were greatly relieved, and felt duly thankful to the reporter who had concealed the "plucky wheelman's" identity under a fictitious name, and thus prevented their trip from being brought to a sudden end, they were none the less impatient to take the road again, and their two days of enforced inactivity hung heavily on their hands. It would not be prudent for them to call upon their friends in the city, for, as Roy ruefully affirmed, they would have to tell them the truth, and they might as well go home as to do that. Concealment was the only thing left to them, but reading and sleeping, with an occasional discussion of their recent experience, were monotonous ways for healthy boys to pass the time. Roy's bruises demanded a little of their care and attention, and before long he had the satisfaction of knowingthat his arm was not as lame as it had been, and that his eyes were slowly resuming their natural color. But it was two weeks before the wondering rustics ceased to turn and gaze after him as he wheeled swiftly along the road.
Saturday morning came at last, and after a light breakfast the three Columbias were brought from their dark closet and set in motion again. Of course we—that is, my two companions and I—knew nothing of the strange things that had taken place on the night we were put into our closet for safe-keeping, and we were on the road at least a week before we heard as much of the story as I have already told you. We were fully two hundred miles from New London when we, most unexpectedly, heard more of it, and back in Mount Airy when we heard the conclusion; so you see I am not yet through with the events that grew out of Roy Sheldon's visit to the city.
Saturday's run was short, for my master insisted that the doctor's orders should be implicitly obeyed, but still it was a hard one. Before they were fairly out of the city limits the sand that was "knee-deep" obstructedtheir way, and made the young wheelmen cast longing glances toward the tow-path which was in plain view. But the sight of several groups of ragged urchins, some of whom tried hard and perseveringly to get a stone up to them, and the knowledge that one of their number was in no condition for a fight, if one was forced upon them, made them keep to the highway.
"But I tell you we'll not do it on Monday for all the canalers in the State," said Roy that night, when he and his companions dismounted before the little inn that was to be their stopping place. "We are so far out of the city now that we shall not see very many boats, and as often as we come in sight of a settlement of shanties, we'll climb up to the road and go around it."
The proprietor of the inn said he was used to the company of wheelmen, and the bountiful supper he set before the boys proved that he was. He gave them comfortable beds too, and on Monday morning showed them a path by which they could take their wheels down to the bank of the canal. It was much easier riding there than it was on the highway, but, as the Omaha wheelman said, they found the "unspeakable mule" there. They met a good many boats going into the city, and nearly every one of them was towed by a span of these interesting creatures. The boys dismounted and got out of the way as often as they saw them coming, but the mules were not to be deceived or cheated out of a stampede by any such shallow artifice as that. They saw the glittering wheels, and that was enough for them. They invariably turned like a flash and tore back along the path as though they were frightened out of their wits, but always stopped their headlong flight just in time to avoid being jerked into the canal. It seemed to me that reasonable persons would have been satisfied with the precautions taken by the boys to avoid trouble, but I soon learned that the boatmen were not reasonable. They swore lustily, hurling their oaths at mules and cyclists with perfect impartiality, and now and then a very angry captain would order his steersman to "hold her clost in to the bank so't he could jump ashore an' pitch themnuisances into the drink"; but when the boys heard such talk as that they mounted and sped lightly along, leaving the captain to recover his good-nature as soon as he got ready, and the driver to manage the mules in anyway he could. By following this course, and by making a flank movement on every "settlement of shanties" that hove in sight, they finally reached Bloomingdale without doing very much riding in the sand.
They were now about a hundred and forty miles from home, and considered their journey fairly begun. Leaving out their first night in New London, they were more than pleased with their experience. Their health was perfect, their brains, to quote from Roy Sheldon, were "as clear as whistles," and they felt equal to any amount of hard work either on the road or at the table. Taking timid women, skittish horses, foolish mules, peppery canal-boat captains, combative boys and ugly dogs into consideration, a trip like this had just enough of the exciting and perilous in it to make it interesting.
Although my master and his chums longedto hear from home, they opened the letters they found waiting for them in Bloomingdale with some fear and trembling. As I looked at it, it did not seem possible that adventures like Roy Sheldon's, and an exploit such as he had performed, could be kept covered up for any length of time (I have been told that such things have a way of "leaking out somewhere"), nor was it at all probable that every one who heard of them would be as considerate of Roy's wishes as theTribunereporter had shown himself to be. I awaited the result with as much excitement as Roy Sheldon exhibited when he seated himself on the porch in front of the hotel and opened one of his mother's letters—the one that bore the latest date. I saw him run his eyes over the closely written pages, and when he laid that letter aside and picked up another, intending to read them in the order in which they were written, I knew before he said a word that his fears were groundless and that no return orders had been received.
"My folks don't suspect anything; how is it with yours?" said he, gleefully. "Motherdoesn't say a word about Peter Smith who was shanghaied and jumped overboard to escape being carried to sea, and that's all the evidence I want that she does not think I am that identical Peter."
Thanks to the thoughtful reporter, who did not want Roy to be called home although hedidwant all the news the boy had it in his power to give him, the truth was never suspected, and after a short rest the young wheelmen turned their backs upon the tow-path and the pugnacious youngsters who lived beside it, and struck out again, this time running through a fine farming country, with just enough timber along the road to break the monotony of the scenery, and afford them shade as often as they felt inclined to take a breathing spell. They were not the only cyclists on the road, as they found before they had left Bloomingdale a dozen miles behind. They were wheeling along in Indian file at a moderate pace, when Joe Wayring, who brought up the rear, was surprised to hear a voice close to him say: