ALL ADRIFT
"What is it?" Polly screamed against the wind. "What are you saying,
Larry?"
Larry jerked his head backward and shouted again.
"I can't hear a word he says," protested Polly, as the three girls
huddled closer together in the bottom of the boat.
"It's something about Blackberry Island," Jess said, as loudly as she
could.
"Oh!" and Polly seemed to understand. "Perhaps the wind is blowing us
toward the island," she added hopefully.
But when fifteen minutes later a huge wave broke over the boat and
Larry set the boys to bailing with heavy tin cans, Polly learned that
they were not blowing toward the island.
"That was Blackberry Island we passed back there, a little after the
wind came up," Larry shouted, leaning across Fred to make them hear.
"We're miles beyond it now, and no telling where we'll end up."
Margy was frightened and Polly was worried because she did not see how
they were to get home if they were blowing farther off the coast all
the time. To Jess, it was something of a daring adventure. None of them
was really aware of the seriousness of the situation. It did not occur
to them that a disabled motor boat might easily be blown out to sea and
either be wrecked in the storm or drift beyond the reach of help. The
supply of food and water--especially water--on board was not large,
and many thoughts were racing through Larry's mind of which he made no
mention.
They did not ship another wave, and by the time the boys had bailed the
_Clara_ fairly dry, it seemed to Fred that the wind was not blowing so
hard. He spoke of it to Larry.
"Yes, she's slowing up, I reckon," admitted Larry. "But don't fool
yourself that all the damage is done. When a wind gets started, seems
like it has to blow all its tricks and do all the damage it can, then
it goes off to find a new place to torment."
"Let's--let's ask riddles," suggested Polly, in a voice that to her
dismay persisted in sounding shaky. "We can't have supper yet," and
she managed a little laugh that coaxed a wavering smile to the serious
faces surrounding her.
"Perhaps we'll have supper at home," Fred said, trying to cheer them up
in his own way. "Won't Mother laugh when we come back with our lunches
still in the boxes?"
Larry said nothing, but his eyes scanned the dark clouds anxiously.
"I'll ask you a riddle," Polly announced. "Now listen--it's a brand new
one Daddy told me. When does the ocean resemble a horse that has broken
loose from his stable?"
"Huh, when it kicks everything in sight," Ward said, scowling at the
choppy sea.
Polly laughed and admitted that he "sounded right."
"But that isn't the answer," she declared firmly.
Fred turned around so that his back was to the wind.
"When it's on the rampage?" he inquired hopefully.
Larry chuckled at that, and said he thought there might be more than
one answer to a riddle.
"Not more than one that really counts," Polly insisted.
"Well, tell us what it is," begged Margy. "I can't think how the ocean
can possibly be like a horse."
Artie snickered and murmured that he had "read about sea horses in a
book."
"The riddle answer is 'When the tied runs out,'" Polly explained. "The
tide of the ocean, you see, and the horse that was tied."
"Who do you suppose invents riddles?" speculated Margy.
No one knew, but Ward was bursting with the desire to give them one.
"Who," he shouted, for the wind was still blowing steadily, "is the
smallest man in the world?"
"Tom Thumb," said Artie, moving his feet to keep them out of a puddle.
"He was make-believe," said Margy scornfully.
"Well, maybe he wasn't," Jess demurred. "Some of the fairy stories must
have been true."
Ward argued that if a fairy story was true, it wasn't a fairy story and
Larry was inclined to agree with this point of view.
"Just the same, I think it was Tom Thumb," the obstinate Artie
declared. "If it wasn't, who is?"
Margy pulled her sweater more closely around her. They were all
thankful that they had brought the warm garments with them, though at
the time they started a sweater had seemed quite useless.
"It's such a hot day we'll perish with the heat," Margy had grumbled.
"Who is the smallest man in the world?" mused Fred. "It must be some
midget, but how are we going to tell?"
Ward shook his head so violently that he was almost dizzy.
"A midget has nothing to do with it," he announced. "You don't even
have to think of midgets."
"If it isn't a midget, I don't know what it is," Margy said. "I give
up."
Polly and Fred echoed her surrender reluctantly. They, too, could not
think of an answer that might fit.
"I don't give up," said Artie. "But I can't think of the answer. That
is, not in a hurry."
Jess was of the same mind, and Larry shook his head when appealed to.
Ward consented to give the answer after Fred insisted that they could
not "wait forever" for Artie to think.
"The smallest man in the world," he informed them, "is a sailor. It's
funny you couldn't guess that."
Five members of the Riddle Club sat up with a jerk. They were so
indignant that they forgot to scold about the wind or the crippled
motor.
"A sailor!" cried Jess. "I knew you'd forgotten the answer yourself!"
"A sailor isn't the smallest man in the world." This from Fred. "Look
at Larry."
"Well, there's more to it," Ward admitted. "The whole answer is that
the smallest man in the world is the sailor who sleeps in his watch."
Larry laughed loudly, though the others appeared to be mystified.
"Ha! ha!" chortled Larry. "That's a good one. If I had had my wits
about me, I could have figured that out. Sleeps in his watch! Ha! ha!"
"Well, how could he?" Polly asked dubiously.
"There's a catch in it," Larry explained, still smiling. "A watch on
shipboard, you know, doesn't mean the kind of timepiece you carry in
your pocket."
"I know!" cried Jess eagerly. "It's the time sailors are on duty."
"Do they go to sleep then?" Margy wanted to know, and Larry said they
didn't if they knew what they were about.
"I think that's a pretty good riddle," pronounced Fred judiciously.
"I always know good ones," Ward declared, and Artie fell over upon him
with crushing effect.
Fred now made a discovery, a not unpleasant one.
"The wind is dying down!" he cried. "Say, it doesn't begin to blow the
way it did."
"If I could get this pesky engine started, we might get home to-night,
after all," Larry muttered.
Polly and Margy exchanged startled glances. They had expected to go
home as a matter of course. But, now they stopped to think of it, if
the engine refused to start, how were they to get back to Sunrise Beach?
"Get home to-night!" Jess echoed. "Oh, what will we do if we can't get
home?"
"If we had a wireless, we could get help," said Artie.
"Never heard of a wireless on a plain motor boat," Larry declared.
"Hardly ever go out of sight of land. Just the same, if I had a set and
could work it, we might do better than we're doing now."
"Why!" said Polly, with a startled cry. "Look! We can't see-- What is
it?"
Something soft and dense and gray was fast closing in around them.
"Fog!" Larry said briefly.
There it was--like a blanket--and to their alarmed senses, almost as
smothering.
"Suppose--suppose we run into something!" stammered Margy fearfully.
"Well, suppose we don't!" Larry retorted cheerfully. "I don't think
there's much danger and, if you ask me, I should say the most important
thing to think about is, 'what can we have to eat?' If you're as hungry
as I am, you'll be opening those boxes in a minute or two. But better
save a snack, in case we have to drift till breakfast time."
It seemed to the older children that Larry's tone sounded a bit forced,
and he did not change his position at the tiller when they opened the
lunch boxes. On his earnest advice, they ate lightly, though Ward in
particular was hungry and said so.
"Never did believe in overeating," said Larry grimly. He had eaten one
sandwich, and now gave them each a small cupful of water.
"What time is it?" asked Fred presently, wishing that he could stop
thinking about the hot clam chowder their mothers always prepared if
the night turned cool.
"Ten after six," Larry replied, glancing at his watch. "Looks as if
we'll have to make a night of it."
"But--but--stay out on the ocean all night?" quavered Margy. "Without
any beds or anything?"
"It won't be so bad," said Jess, trying her best to feel that this was
only an exciting adventure, but failing utterly.
"I've got a couple of old blankets tucked away somewhere and they'll
keep you warm. Now the wind's gone down, there's nothing to worry
about," Larry assured her, with far more cheerfulness than he felt.
"But our mothers will worry," Margy objected.
"Well, of course, they'll wonder where we are," said Fred. "But I guess
they can figure out that if Larry and his boat don't come back, we're
somewhere all together. Here's a blanket, Polly; better wrap up."
The blanket smelled of oil, for it had been crammed into a small
cupboard close to the engine, but its extra warmth was very welcome.
The fog was cold and damp, and, deprived of the sun, the sea seemed
cold and depressing.
Polly made Jess and Margy sit down close together and wrapped them in
one fold. Then she twisted herself in beside them and Fred pulled the
end over her. They were wrapped snugly, "like caramels," Jess said.
"Try to go to sleep," Larry advised. "I'm sorry there isn't room to
stretch out, but I guess you can manage forty winks the way you are."
Margy was sure she could never sleep in her cramped position, but
before long the three heads were nodding and the girls slept as
serenely as though they had been in their comfortable beds at home.
Ward and Artie, on the floor, pillowed their heads against their
sisters' knees and slept also, but Fred sat beside Larry and watched.
When Polly awoke with a start, several hours later, she looked up into
a sky thickly spangled with stars. The fog had lifted and the boat was
drifting before a stiff breeze. As soon as her eyes became accustomed
to the inky blackness, she made out two figures sitting erect and
silent.
"Is that you, Fred?" she called softly. "Where--where are we?"
The shorter figure stirred, and Fred crawled stiffly across the narrow
little seat to speak to her.
"It's midnight," he said. "Aren't the stars pretty?"