THE HAUNTED ISLAND.
Luck did not seem to favor the anglers, for, though they paddled along
the shores, casting into the shadows, and varied this by trying deeper
water, the sun had set before they got a single rise. At last, however,
there was a swirl as Crane lightly dropped a “Morning Glory” as far as
he could send it from the canoe, and the buzz of the reel made the
hearts of both lads jump.
“I’ve got one—by jinks! I’ve got one,” palpitated Sile.
“You haven’t got him yet,” said Sleuth. “He’s hooked, but you can’t be
sure of him until we dip him into the canoe.”
“Ginger! see him go,” cried Crane. “He must be a bouncer. Grab the
paddle, Pipe, and follow up.”
Having reeled in, Sleuth did as directed, and at the first dip of his
blade the boys saw the fish leap clear of the water, with a tremendous
slap, as it tried to shake the hook free. With a splash, he fell back
and took to running again.
“Shades of the Pilgrim Fathers!” gasped Sleuth in envious admiration.
“He’s a monster. He’s the father of them all. Why didn’t I have the luck
to hook him?”
“It’s a salmon, and a peach,” fluttered Crane, reeling in as the fish
yielded. “Have that net ready, Pipe.”
“No hurry,” returned Sleuth wisely. “Don’t you get the idea that that
fellow is going to let us dip him in a hurry. You’ve got your work cut
out for you for some time, old man.”
He was quite right about this, for the gamey fish fought like a shark,
resorting to all the devices and stratagems of its kind. Time after time
the salmon leaped high out of the water, and whenever it did so both
boys were filled with apprehension until the tautening of the line again
told them that the creature had not broken away. At least twenty minutes
were consumed in the delightful, nerve-racking task of playing that
fish, and Crane repeatedly brought him close to the canoe, only to have
him turn and run with a fresh burst of strength and a persistence that
threatened to leave the reel bare of line. At last, however, with the
soft twilight thickening, the salmon betrayed unmistakable evidence of
weariness. Slowly and resentfully it permitted itself to be brought
closer, its efforts to run becoming shorter and weaker. Grasping the
bamboo handle of the landing net, Piper awaited the proper moment, ready
to dip.
“Work easy, Sile—work easy,” entreated Piper. “Don’t let him fool you.
He may be playing possum.”
“Jest yeou be ready to do yeour part of the job,” advised Crane. “That’s
all I want of yeou.”
To Sleuth’s credit, he did his part well, and the very first dip of the
net secured the salmon, who came out of the water writhing in the meshes
and shining beautifully, despite the semi-darkness.
“Bate he weighs five paounds,” exulted the triumphant angler, removing
the capture from the net. “Oh, say, Sleuth, what do you think of that!
Them fellers that ketched a little mess of brook traout this morning are
beat to death.”
Sleuth had nothing to say. He sat there in the bottom of the canoe
gazing dejectedly at the beautiful fish, his heart heavy with chagrin
because his was not the glory of the capture.
“But there may be others around here,” he suddenly exclaimed. “Perhaps
I’ll get the next one.”
“Do you realize that it’s dark and we’re clean over on the side of the
lake opposite aour camp?” asked Sile. “It’s too late to fish any more
tonight, old feller, and we’d better be hikin’ for Pleasant Point.”
“That’s it!” rasped Sleuth. “That’s the way of it! You don’t want me to
catch anything. You want to hustle back with this big fellow, so that
you can crow over me.”
“Oh, flumydiddle!” retorted the other boy. “Yeou can see for yourself
that it’s gettin’ too dark, and we’ve got a long distance to go. The
fellers will be worried abaout us if we don’t git in pretty soon.
Yeou’ve got some sense; anyway, we told Granger that you had.”
Piper yielded with poor grace, and when the canoe was headed toward
Pleasant Point there was little vigor in his strokes. He had boasted of
his skill as an angler, and, returning empty-handed with a companion
crowned with victory, he seemed even now in fancy to hear the jibes of
the three lads who were waiting at Camp Oakdale.
Crane made no complaint, even though he realized that the canoe was
being propelled almost wholly by his paddle; really generous, although
inclined to practical jokes, Sile was sorry for Sleuth.
The rekindled fire was blazing on Pleasant Point, and this light guided
them. Presently, near at hand and only a short distance away, a wooded
island loomed in the darkness.
“Gee!” said Crane in a suppressed voice. “That’s Spirit Island. We’re
pretty close.”
“Yah!” Piper flung back. “You’re scared, I’ll bet.”
“No, I ain’t,” denied the other boy stoutly. “I didn’t take no more
stock in the ghost part of Granger’s yarn than yeou did, not a bit. Say,
if we had time I’d jest as lief land on that island right naow.”
“I dare you!” challenged Sleuth. “Come on.”
“But yeou know we ain’t got time.”
“We can just step ashore for a minute, and then we’ll have the
satisfaction of telling the fellows at camp what we did. It won’t take
more than a jiffy or two.”
Crane, however, continued to protest, which seemed to make his
canoe-mate all the more set upon the project. They had paused a moment
in their paddling, and Piper, dipping his blade, swung the frail craft
toward the near-by shore, beyond which the dark, gloomy pines could be
seen standing thickly a rod or more from the water’s edge.
“I’m going to put my foot on that island tonight,” declared Sleuth. “The
rest of you had lots of fun with me last night, but I’ll show you that I
ain’t afraid of——”
He stopped suddenly, the paddle upheld and dripping. Seemingly from the
midst of the black pines came the long-drawn, mournful howling of a dog,
and that sound, so doleful, so eerie, sent a shivering thrill through
both lads.
“Great Jehosaphat!” gasped Crane.
“Did you hear it?” whispered Piper.
“Think I’m deef? Course I heard it.”
“It was a dog.”
“Mebbe it was.”
“Of course it was. Don’t you know the howling of a dog when you hear
it?”
“I know the howlin’ of any ordinary dog, but somehaow that saounded
different to me.”
“Different? What do you mean?”
“Why,” faltered Sile, “it—it was—was sort of spooky, yeou know. Didn’t
saound just like the howlin’ of any real live dog I ever heard.”
“But,” protested Piper, “it had to be a live dog, you know; it couldn’t
be anything else.”
“Perhaps,” suggested the other boy, with a touch of mischief, “it was a
cougar.”
“This is a fine time to try to crack any stale chestnuts,” flung back
Sleuth. “I’d really give something to know just what it was we heard.”
“Perhaps,” returned Crane, confident now that his companion had lost all
desire to make an immediate landing on the island, “we might find aout
by goin’ ashore and prowlin’ araound in them dark woods. Come on.”
But now it was Sleuth who objected. “There isn’t time, you chump; we’ve
got to get back to the camp. Only for that, I’d be willing to——”
He was interrupted again by a repetition of that protracted, mournful
howling, which seemed to echo through the black pines and apparently
proceeded from a point much nearer than before. The sound of a real
flesh-and-blood dog howling mournfully in the night and in a lonely
place is enough to give the least superstitious person a creepy feeling,
and, with the tragic story of the hermit and his faithful dog fresh in
their minds, it was not at all remarkable that the two lads should now
feel themselves shivering and find it no simple matter to keep their
teeth from chattering.
“The confaounded critter is coming this way!” whispered Sile excitedly.
“We’re pretty near the island, aren’t we?” returned Sleuth. “Let’s be
getting along toward camp.”
With the usual perverseness of human nature, even though he fancied he
could feel his hair rising, Crane proposed to linger a while longer.
“If we do,” he said, “mebbe we’ll see something.”
“Lot of good that will do us,” hissed Sleuth. “And there’s a big chance
of seeing anything in this darkness, isn’t there? I thought you wanted
to get to the camp?”
“And I thought _yeou_ wanted to land on the island. Yeou don’t believe
in spooks, yeou know.”
“What’s that got to do with it? Think I want to be chewed up by a
hungry, vicious dog? I’m no fool.”
“Mebbe not,” admitted Crane, in a manner not at all intended to soothe
the other boy. “Public opinion is sometimes mistaken abaout folks.”
Sleuth dipped his paddle nervously into the water.
“I’m hungry, anyhow,” he declared. “They’ll have supper waiting for us.
It will spoil.”
“Look!” sibilated Sile, crouching a bit and lifting his arm to point
toward the island. “I can see something! There’s something movin’! See
it, Pipe—see it?”
Out from the edge of the pines, faintly discernible through the
darkness, came something white which plainly resembled a dog. As both
lads stared, motionless, at this thing, it seemed to squat upon its
haunches, and, with lifted muzzle, it sent out across the water a
repetition of that fearsome howling.
“It’s the spirit of Old Lonely’s dog!” panted Crane. “Sure as shootin’
it is, and we’ve both seen and heard it.”
“See! See!” fluttered Piper in a perfect panic. “There’s something else
coming out of the woods! It’s a man!”
Slowly, like a thing materializing from thin air, a white figure
resembling a human being appeared before their staring eyes. It remained
standing close to the border of the dark pines, motionless, but seeming
to become more and more distinct as they stared at it in stony silence.
And now their teeth were chattering, beyond question.
“I guess you’re right, Sleuth,” Crane finally gulped; “that supper will
spile if we don’t get to camp as soon as we can.”
With something like frantic haste and vigor they wielded the paddles.