CHAPTER XSALVAGE
The task which Jack had undertaken was not so formidable as it might have been, for everything was in his favor. The end of a manila hawser was cast to him. This he made fast to the quarter-bitts, and then he headed due east to clear the end of Greenport breakwater. When once she felt the strain of the hawser holding her back, the littleSea-Larktugged and fretted like a greyhound puppy at its leash, for she had a dead weight of several hundred tons dragging at her heels. And for a few minutes that dead weight almost seemed to be anchored securely to the bottom of the ocean. But the steady pull of the sloop presently began to tell. The schooner moved sluggishly, reluctantly, but the main point was that she moved, and before long theSea-Larkhad enough way on to make a steady three knots anhour, for the wind could not have been blowing from a more satisfactory quarter.
Exciting moments came when a particularly strong gust swept down on the two craft. With her boom swung away out, to catch the full benefit of the wind, theSea-Larkstrained her slender mast now and again more than Jack cared to contemplate. There was no “give” to ease her, with that solid weight dragging astern. Sometimes, also, a following sea hit the sloop viciously, breaking over her quarter, half drenching the boy at her wheel, and pouring down into the cockpit. Once, after the sloop had been struck in this manner, Captain Jordan hailed theSea-Larkfrom the deck of the schooner.
Putting his hand to his ear Jack turned to listen.
“I’ll send you a man to give a hand if you like,” the fisherman shouted down the wind.
Jack could not make his own voice heard in reply, but there was no mistaking the meaning of the wave of his arm, with which he signaled back.
“Not if I know it!” he said emphatically to his companion. “What do you think, Rod?”
“I should say not! Why, we must be almost half-way back now. There would be no fun in it if we let some one else complete the job.”
“That’s just what I’m worrying about,” observed Jack. “We’re on the way, all right, and if nobody interrupts us we shall get there safely enough. But where is that tug? I can’t even hear her squeaking.”
“She must have left Rockmore long ago,” said Rod. “They’d have some difficulty in locating us while this haze keeps as bad as it is now, but they’ll find us, sure enough.”
“I wonder what will happen when the tug does bob up,” Jack said. “If it arrived just now I don’t think I’d have the cheek to refuse to give up the tow.”
“Why not?” So far as Rod could see they were doing perfectly satisfactorily.
“Well,” replied Jack with a laugh, “you’ve got to remember that we aren’t under steam-power, and they are, for one thing. Also, the tug is Barker’s boat, and perhaps—”
“Rubbish!” declared Rod. “If you take my advice you’ll hang on as long as the sloop holds together and as long as you’re doing what you contracted to do. Didn’t the captain say he was glad to have you give him a tow? And didn’t he agree that if you began to tow you could finish it?”
“Well, we’ll see,” replied Jack. “I’ve got no complaints at present. Never heard of such luck!”
“Five hundred dollars seems an awful lot of money for doing a little bit of a thing like this, though, doesn’t it?” asked Rodney.
“Yes, it sounds a lot to us, but you must remember that theGrace and Ellais worth thousands of dollars and has a full catch of ground-fish under her hatches. It isn’t exactly the idea of losing the salvage money that makes me hope the tug will miss us somehow, though,” he added with a grim smile.
“It’s quite enough reason,” observed Rod.
“Yes, but I want to keep this tow till we get right into the harbor,” said Jack. “I can’t very well be in two places at the same time,but I’d give a month’s earnings at the ferry to be standing near Mr. Simon Barker and watch his face when he sees this schooner of his being towed in by theSea-Lark. It won’t take him more than about a minute to realize that I’m getting a very nice revenge for something he said to me only a couple of days ago. Slip up for’ard there, Rod, will you? I believe I spotted the Point then, and I want to make sure of my bearings. The haze seems to be clearing off a bit—”
Then something happened which he had been dreading. Across the water, from the direction of Four Fathom bell-buoy, which theSea-Larkhad now left full three miles astern, came the sharp, piping call of the tug.
Four short squeaks, a long one, and finally a short one.
“No mistakingher,” was Rod’s only comment. Much to Jack’s delight, the captain of theGrace and Elladid not attempt to signal back. Such a proceeding would, however, have been difficult anyway, against the wind.
“There’s the Point!” suddenly cried Rod from the bow and a minute later Jack altered his course a shade, for the weather was clearing up rapidly and he saw it was necessary to make a little more southing. At the same time he glanced back over his shoulder. The squawk of the tug was now insistent.
“I believe we shall manage it yet,” he said delightedly. “Another twenty minutes or so will take us round the end of the breakwater, and the tug hasn’t spotted us yet.”
But, as he spoke, the rain ceased, and presently the ocean was visible for miles.
“Here she comes!” Jack cried as his eyes fell on the distant shape of the fussy littleSimon P. Barker. “Tearing along like a snail! And I guess her skipper’s roaring mad now that he can see what happened.”
“Keep going! Keep going!” urged Rod, almost dancing with delight.
“You bet I’m going to keep going!” replied Jack, with the light of battle in his eyes. “He’d bust his boilers in catching up with usnow, before we’re round the breakwater. Did you ever hear Steve Burke talk when he’s real mad, Rod?”
“I don’t remember ever even seeing him.”
“Well, you will in a while, and it’s no Quaker meeting he’s coming to, either! He knows what to expect from Mr. Barker as soon as he lands ashore, for missing the schooner. Rod, I’m not going to let go now. Burke wouldn’t dare to run us down. Of course if Captain Jordan cuts us adrift, that settles it; but my guess is that he won’t.”
“It’s a pretty race, isn’t it!” said Jack, a moment later. “Two tortoises, and one of them hobbled! Thank goodness Burke daren’t drive his old tug any faster, or her rotten engines would shake themselves to pieces.”
Meanwhile the irate skipper of the tug was protesting loudly with his squeaky siren. TheSimon P. Barkerwallowed and rolled nearer and nearer, but theSea-Larkwas fast approaching the safe refuge of the harbor. Soon the tug was only about a thousand yards astern, but by then Jack was negotiating the end of thebreakwater, and there only remained the straight run up the harbor to the wharf. The tug, however, evidently had no intention of relinquishing her claim, for she fussed up to the heels of the sloop and hailed.
“Let go that hawser!” Burke shouted angrily to Jack.
“Can’t do it. I’m under contract,” replied Jack, steadily.
“Well, I’ll bust your contract, and you too, if you don’t hand me that hawser mighty quick,” Burke snapped back. His practised hand was at the wheel, and the tug was now gliding through the water within a few feet of theSea-Lark’sside. Jack, however, did not give way an inch. He was by no means sure that Burke would not bump into him and secure the tow by main force. But the tug’s skipper knew just a little too much of sea law to carry his tactics as far as that. At this stage Captain Jordan put in a word.
“Let the lad alone,” he shouted. “He came first, and I had to give him the job.”
“And what’s your owner going to say toyou?” Burke yelled back to the captain of the schooner.
“He can say what he likes,” returned Captain Jordan. “I’ve got a word or two to put into his ear for sending me to sea with rotten spars, and I’ve a right to arrange for a tow whenever I think it prudent. Now beat it, or you’ll be having a smash-up yet, and then there’ll berealmoney to pay out.”
With no alternative, Burke sidled away from the two vessels, muttering savagely, but realizing that he could put in no just claim to complete the tow. By that time Gull Island had been reached, and Jack could make out figures on the wharves ahead.
“Jordan is a brick for standing up for you like that,” Rod said.
“I thought he would,” replied Jack. “But, you know, a bargain is a bargain, and we had the law on our side, after all.”
“Our friend Burke looked as though he would like to bite your head off.”
“He wasn’t very polite about it, was he? But you just wait a few minutes till we drawup alongside Barker’s wharf. That’s when the fun will begin.”
They plodded slowly on until Captain Jordan hailed them from the schooner.
“Stand by to cast that hawser off,” he directed.
“Aye, aye!” replied Jack. “Rod, lay hold of that line, and be ready to slack away.”
“Let go!” shouted Captain Jordan at last.
The hawser fell with a splash into the water, and Jack brought the sloop round into the wind, leaving theGrace and Ellawith enough way on to sidle to her berth.
An angry face appeared at the edge of the wharf.
“What d’ye mean by meddling in my affairs?” demanded Mr. Barker, scowling down on the boys.
“Meddling?” said Jack unruffled. “I was giving her a little tow. Doesn’t she look as though she needed it? It was quite a salvage job.”
“Salvage!” Mr. Barker’s surprise and consternation were ludicrous. “You get no salvageout o’ me, young man! No one asked you to interfere. What do you suppose I sent my tug out for?”
“Tug didn’t come in time,” put in Captain Jordan. “I had to engage the sloop to make sure.”
“You engaged her?” queried Barker in horrified tones.
“What else could I do?” retorted Captain Jordan. “The tide would have turned in another twenty minutes. Maybe you wouldn’t have minded the schooner being piled up on the sand, but I minded.”
“Then you’ll pay for it,” snarled Barker. “I won’t. No, sir! Not a red cent! What did you arrange to pay this—this kid?”
“Five hundred dollars, and—”
“Five hundred!” echoed Mr. Barker in agony.
“Why not? He saved you perhaps ten times that much.” Captain Jordan was becoming annoyed at having to bandy words of this order from ship to wharf.
Simon Barker leaned over and wagged hisfinger in the direction of the captain of theSea-Lark.
“Don’t you think for one minute,” he spluttered, “that I’ll ever pay it.”
“We’ll see,” replied Jack, quietly.
There were few patrons for the ferry that day, and after landing Rodney on the Point Jack returned to town and hurried home to his dinner. He reached the house before his father was through and quickly told his story. Mr. Holden was neither hopeful nor helpful.
“Don’t have anything to do with the man,” he begged. “He’ll find some loophole of escape, and goodness knows there has been unpleasantness enough already.”
“But, Dad, Iearnedit!” the boy protested. “Captain Jordan knows what he is talking about. I’m going to consult a lawyer. Mr. Merrill will see the thing is settled fairly. What’s the use of letting an old skinflint like Barker cheat me out of the money?”
Mr. Holden made a vague motion with his hands.
“If you consult Mr. Merrill you’ll have topay him, remember,” he said. “Lawyers only cost you money in the end.”
“Maybe,” said Jack, “but you know quite well I should never be able to get that salvage money without a lawyer’s help. I want your permission to put the case in his hands, Dad.”
“All right,” said Mr. Holden reluctantly.
Five minutes later Jack was explaining to the jovial little lawyer all that had happened.
“Well, Mr. Barker hates to part with his cash,” said the man of law. “But I’ll see him in a day or two when he has calmed down, and perhaps he will be in a more reasonable frame of mind then.”
Mr. Merrill had the reputation of being able to pour oil on troubled waters more effectively than any other attorney in the county, but for once his skill in such matters proved ineffective. Simon Barker was as obstinate as a mule. He declared he would be sold up and even go to prison rather than pay five hundred dollars to Jack Holden.
“But,” said the lawyer, reporting the outcome of his interview to Jack two days later,“he will pay in the end. He can’t help paying. He can fight, and stand us off for a long time if he wants to, but sooner or later, Jack, he’s got to come to terms. So sit tight, my boy, and let Simon and me do the worrying.”