THE GOLDEN GALLEON.
With his seaman's knife drawn ready for action--the badly-scared
sailor rushed out on to the deck prepared to sell his existence
dearly. To his amazement the deck was empty of all life, however.
Suddenly the hoarse cry sounded again, and this time he located its
source correctly. Seated on the crumbling maintop of the ship was a
huge, evil-looking bird of the kind called "Gallinazos" in South
America. The carrion creature eyed the newcomer with a red malevolent
eye and again gave voice to its harsh croak--the sound that had so
startled him at its first utterance.
"Ah, you old death bird, so you think you are going to get me, do
you?" shouted the indignant castaway, as the bird looked at him with
unpleasant anticipation.
"Well, you're not. Not if I have to shoot you."
With a heavy flop of its wings the carrion bird soared slowly away
toward the west as the sailor fairly shouted his defiance.
"Ah, my fine fellow," cried Bill to himself, "you have given me
renewed hope. I know that birds of your feather are good strong
flyers, but you've got to light somewhere. I judge from the fact that
you came visiting here that I can't be more than two hundred miles
from land--maybe not so much."
The thought was a cheering one and as the sailor, having filled his
pockets with doubloons and other coins, and given the dead men a
sea-burial by consigning them to the deep, sculled slowly back to the
Eleanor Jones, his mind was busy with plans of escape.
Now it chanced that among the cargo carried by the barque was a small
launch intended for the use of a plantation owner in South America.
Bill recollected it with peculiar vividness on account of the peculiar
shape of its propeller, which he could see through the crate that
surrounded it when it was hoisted on board. He had asked the
manufacturer's representative, who had superintended the loading of
the motorboat at Bath, why the wheel was shaped in such a queer way.
He recollected the answer now with joy, for he had conceived a daring
plan.
"Why, Mr. Mate," the manufacturer's representative had replied to his
query, "that's what we call a weedless wheel. That is, it is specially
designed for service in South American rivers of shallow draught where
an ordinary propeller would soon get entangled in the weeds and water
plants and stop. We guarantee this wheel to go through any tangle,
just as an eel would."
"To go through any tangle."
The words sang in Bill's brain.
Why couldn't he get out of the Sargasso seaweed tangle in the little
sixteen-foot craft?
"At least, it is better than waiting here for a horrible death," he
reasoned to himself.
After a hasty meal in the lonely galley, Bluewater Bill set to work to
uncrate the little launch. Fortunately for his purpose the Eleanor
Jones had been fitted, in common with many modern sailing vessels,
with a "donkey engine" for trimming the heavy sails and hoisting
cargo, which was operated by a gasolene engine. Several cans of
gasolene formed part of the engine's equipment. This solved the
problem of fuel and for the rest--though Bill had never run a
launch--the manufacturer's directions seemed explicit enough. These
directions Bill discovered stored away in a locker of the tiny craft.
He spent the rest of the day reading them carefully and going over
every part of the engine till he had familiarized himself with the
function of each.
After a good night's rest, the next day he set about laying in a stock
of provisions and filling several kegs with water from the ship's
tanks. This done, and the little vessel's gasolene receptacle filled
and her lubricating devices furnished from the supply intended for
oiling the "donkey engine" of the Jones, Bill was ready to start.
Ready, that is, except for the fact that as yet he had not considered
how he was going to get the launch over the side.
For a time this seemed an insurmountable problem, but Bill had all the
ingenuity of a sailor. With a small "jack" he tilted first one end of
the launch and then the other and passed slings under it. Then he
rigged a block and tackle to the mizzen-mast, and heaved on it till he
had dragged the launch along the deck on rollers, made by sawing a
spare spar into lengths, and hoisted it up on the poop deck. Then,
detaching his tackle from the mast, he swung the boom overside with
his tackle attached to its outer end. The end of the tackle was once
more made fast to the slings supporting the launch and Bill attached
another rope to her which was then belayed around the mast, in order
to prevent the little craft swinging out to the end of the boom as
soon as he raised her a few feet from the deck. This done, he hauled
away on his tackle till the tiny motor-boat swung free. Then he made
fast his tackle on a belaying-pin and gently paid out the restraining
rope he had fastened round the mast till the launch swung at the end
of the boom suspended twenty feet in the air. It was then an easy task
to lower her with the block and tackle till she floated on the water.
Bill swarmed out on the boom and cut loose the tackles, and soon had
the launch snuggled alongside the Eleanor Jones. He then proceeded to
stock her with food and water he had made ready, and in addition
strapped round his waist the captain's revolver which he had found in
the cabin. These preparations concluded he was ready to cast off. His
eye had taken in, during the brief period he had been in the Sargasso,
that while it appeared to be at a casual glance simply a wide expanse
of weed, in reality there were "water-lanes" in it which were clear of
the entanglement. Bill resolved to follow these passages wherever
practicable.
"The longest way round may be the shortest way out," he told himself.
He soon had the small three-horse engine going, following to the
letter the instructions set forth in the book of directions he had
found.
It was with a light heart that he steered his tiny craft from the side
of the imprisoned Eleanor Jones,
"Good-bye, old ship," he exclaimed, as he headed his craft toward the
west--the direction in which the gallinazo had flown and in which he
judged land must lie.
To his delight the patent wheel worked perfectly. Occasionally, it is
true, Bill was compelled to stop the engine and, leaning over the
stern, clear it of the few weeds that clung to it with a boat-hook he
had brought for the purpose, but otherwise it answered every claim of
its makers, that it could not be checked by even the densest tangle.
As the sun set and darkness closed in, Bill noticed, to his
gratification, that the weed seemed to be thinning out and that the
water-lanes grew more and more frequent.
He made a hasty meal off the provisions he had brought with him and,
after a long period spent in trying to keep his eyes open, he was fain
to lie down on the bottom of the launch and, with the engine shutoff,
drift through the blackness till daylight. He awoke with a start. The
launch was tossing about wildly and an occasional shower of spray flew
over her side.
She had cleared the Sargasso and was in the open sea at last.
Bill started up the engine as soon as he got the sleep out of his
eyes, and tossing the spume from her bow the little craft fairly
leaped through the tumbling waters. But Bill soon saw that if she was
to handle in such a sea he would have to reduce speed or risk getting
swamped. He therefore throttled down the engine and rigged a tarpaulin
over the bow to keep out the wave crests, part of which came tumbling
aboard.
"If it freshens I don't stand much of a chance to get out alive,"
mused the sailor, as he sat in the stern of his cockle-shell, with
only a frail bottom of half-inch planking between him and the floor of
the sea.
The launch in fact, while a staunch little craft, was better adapted
for lake or river navigation than as a sea-goer.
"However, I might as well keep on as stay still," mused the
philosophical Bill, baling out the water that now came tumbling aboard
in far too great quantities to render the situation a pleasant one. So
the day passed and it was not till the next morning, after an
exhausting night of constant terror that the launch was about to sink,
that Bill saw the smoke of a distant steamer as he rose on a wave
crest.
Would her officers see him?
That was the question that agitated his mind as he waved frantically
while she drew nearer and he saw that she was one of the crack liners
of the Central American Trading Company. As she raced through the
water a great "Bone" of white spray was sent out from each side of her
keen cutwater. A volume of thick black smoke rolled from her yellow
funnels. She would have made a fine sight to any one less in fear of
his life than Bluewater Bill.
Till she was within half-a-mile of him it seemed the big craft was
going to pass him by, but suddenly, to his joy, Bill saw her change
her course and bear down for him. As she drew nearer, rolling mightily
in the high sea, a man on the bridge hailed him in stentorian tones
through a megaphone.
"Ahoy! what lunatic are you?"
"Bluewater Bill of the Eleanor Jones of Bath,--castaway," yelled back
the drifter in the launch, who had by this time shut off his engine.
"We'll stand by and lower a boat," was the next hail and soon Bill was
on his way aboard the Yucatan--for that was the vessel's name--and the
tiny launch, which had been the means of saving his life and almost of
his losing it, was tossing far astern.
But Bill, perilous as his position was until he was actually in the
Yucatan's lifeboat, had not lost his presence of mind. He realized in
a flash that a castway with a pocket full of gold would be an object
of suspicion and he had his own reasons for not wanting to tell how he
had obtained it, so, before the ship's boat reached the launch the old
mariner emptied his pockets of their golden freight and sent the coins
tumbling into the sea. He retained only the one piece that he had
loaned to Billy Barnes as an evidence of his good faith.
"And now, boys," concluded the old mariner, "what do you think of my
story?"
"Why, it's the most marvelous thing I ever heard of!" exclaimed Frank.
"But do you think it is TRUE? You believe me?"
"We certainly do," chorused both the boys, much impressed by the old
salt's narration.
"Well, the only problem is to get to the galleon," resumed Bill.
"That would be easy in the Golden Eagle," was Frank's quiet rejoinder.
"She could be fitted with aluminum pontoons, and, with a propeller
device installed, we could start her upward from the water as easily
as from the land."
"By the Lord High Admiral's slippers!--do you think you could, lads?"
exclaimed the old mariner in great excitement.
"I am certain of it," was the quiet rejoinder.
"Boys, there's enough gold there to make us all millionaires."
"Hardly enough for that, I should think," smiled Frank, "but at least
it is worth trying for. What do you say, boys, shall we make a dash
for the golden galleon?"
"Will we? Why, Frank, if you'll lead the way we'll follow all right,"
cried Billy, wild with excitement at the notion.
Hastily the eager group sketched out the rough details of the
expedition and it was agreed that the boys should start on their
treasure quest immediately after the cup race--provided they could
obtain their father's permission.
"Hurray for the treasure of the Sargasso!" shouted Billy, throwing up
his hat and catching it again and almost upsetting the lamp in his
enthusiasm.
But his excitement received a sudden check.
A man was racing by the house on a galloping horse and as he tore
along he shouted the alarming cry of:
"Fire! fire! fire!"