THE BOY SCOUTS
OF THE
LIFE SAVING CREW
BY
SCOUT MASTER ROBERT SHALER
AUTHOR OF “BOY SCOUTS OF THE SIGNAL CORPS,” “BOY SCOUTS OF
PIONEER CAMP,” “BOY SCOUTS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY,” “BOY SCOUTS
ON PICKET DUTY,” “BOY SCOUTS OF THE FLYING SQUADRON,” “BOY SCOUTS
AND THE PRIZE PENNANT,” “BOY SCOUTS OF THE NAVAL RESERVE,” “BOY
SCOUTS IN THE SADDLE,” “BOY SCOUTS FOR CITY IMPROVEMENT,” ETC., ETC.
NEW YORK
HURST & COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Sterling
Boy Scout Books
By Scout Master Robert Shaler
_Bound in cloth_ _Ten titles_
1 Boy Scouts of the Signal Corps.
2 Boy Scouts of Pioneer Camp.
3 Boy Scouts of the Geological Survey.
4 Boy Scouts of the Life Saving Crew.
5 Boy Scouts on Picket Duty.
6 Boy Scouts of the Flying Squadron.
7 Boy Scouts and the Prize Pennant.
8 Boy Scouts of the Naval Reserve.
9 Boy Scouts in the Saddle.
10 Boy Scouts for City Improvement.
_You can purchase any of the above books at the price you paid for this
one, or the publishers will send any book, postpaid, upon receipt of
25c._
HURST & CO., Publishers
432 Fourth Avenue, New York
Copyright, 1914, by Hurst & Company.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. Out on the Trestle 5
II. The Rescue 17
III. Coming Events 27
IV. Plans and Projects 37
V. A Visit of Inspection 48
VI. The Beach Patrols 59
VII. The Stranded Schooner 69
VIII. The Rescue 78
IX. Home Again—and Away 87
X. The Silver King 95
XI. Down the Coast 105
XII. At the Lighthouse 115
XIII. Saved from the Storm 126
XIV. Captain Bowling’s Story 133
XV. Into the Everglades 140
XVI. The Friendly Seminoles 150
The Boy Scouts of the Life Saving Crew.
CHAPTER I.
OUT ON THE TRESTLE.
“We’re almost there now,” said Alec Sands as he steered the big touring
car around a curve in the road and out upon a long stretch of hard,
smooth, well-oiled clay. “Unless I’m mistaken, that white church spire
over there beyond the fringe of palm trees marks the end of our journey.
I really didn’t know it was going to be such a long run, or I’d have
told Bronson to send some lunch with us.”
“Wish you had!” Chester Brownell exclaimed, leaning back in his seat in
the tonneau. “I’m almost starved!”
“I reckon we can make up for it to-night,” added Billy Worth, who sat in
front beside Alec. “This Santario is quite a place, isn’t it, Alec?”
“I think so,” answered young Sands. “From what I’ve heard, I guess it’s
a sizable town now, though only a few years ago it was a mere village
inhabited by fishermen. Someone discovered that the soil two miles
inland from the village was suited for raising oranges, so he bought up
several acres and planted an orange grove. Since then others have
followed the leader, and now the village has grown so large that the
oldest inhabitant can hardly recognize it.”
The three young tourists who were speeding along at a good thirty miles
an hour, were all members of a troop of Boy Scouts whose summer
headquarters were located at Pioneer Lake, “up North.” Alec Sands, the
captain of the Otter patrol, and Billy Worth, a member of the Wolf
patrol, had been prominent in many of the contests held at Pioneer Camp.
Chester Brownell of the Otters was less well known to the boys of the
troop, but Alec had come to know him at Hilltop School and had found in
him a promising athlete.
At this time the boys were far away from the scene of their earlier
adventures, being on a visit at the winter residence of Alec’s
parents—Palmdune, a splendid mansion near a picturesque old town on the
Florida seacoast.
It was early spring and the weather had not yet begun to be oppressively
warm. Indeed, the nights were still cold with frequent threats of
frost,—that dread enemy of the budding orange groves. Alternating with
days and nights of mild stillness were intervals of semi-storm, of rough
winds that swept the low-lying shore and menaced coastwise shipping with
the danger of being blown landward upon the numerous sandbars and keys.
Like other towns and villages in that part of the country, Santario had
thrived all winter on the influx of wealthy Northerners who were
accustomed to spend “the worst months of the year” there. And now these
pleasant resorts were just beginning to slide back into their usual
grooves of inactivity, and to have the quiet, unruffled appearance which
was most familiar though not most welcome to their oldest inhabitants.
Claynor, the nearest railway station to Santario, was the town where the
three boys had spent that day. The place was rich with interesting
historical associations, and they had enjoyed visiting it. Its little
museum contained many relics not only of the earliest Spanish colonists
but also of the later wars with the Seminole Indians under their great
chief Osceola. At present the boys were returning, late in the
afternoon, to Palmdune, where Alec hoped to have another guest for the
Easter vacation.
His expected guest, who had not yet arrived, was Hugh Hardin, formerly
leader of the Wolf patrol at Pioneer Camp. After some hesitation on
Hugh’s part, owing to the fact that he and Alec had not always been on
the best of terms in the past, Hugh had persuaded himself that to
decline Alec’s invitation without sufficient reason would be both
ungracious and unfriendly, and so he had accepted it in the same spirit
with which it was given. As a matter of fact, Hugh had done so gladly,
for he had a genuine liking and respect for his rival, Alec Sands, and
he had usually been the first to regret and to make amends for their
previous unpleasantness. On his journey down South, Hugh was even now
eagerly looking forward to the visit, while at the same time his three
friends, bowling along the highway in the big touring car, were
discussing his arrival.
“If we take the car out again to-morrow to drive over to Claynor to meet
Hugh, we’ll take some grub with us,—you can bet on that!” said Alec. “I
thought there was some kind of an inn at Claynor, but we found only that
clam-and-oyster parlor!”
“Gee, what a joint!” exclaimed Billy in an aggrieved tone. “Bucking
broncos wouldn’t have dragged me into it!”
“Me, neither,” Chester added with ungrammatical emphasis.
“I had a letter from camp to-day—from Buck Winter,” he continued. “We
left so early I didn’t have time to show it to you fellows before we
started. Buck says Tom Sherwood has been elected temporary leader of our
patrol, Alec. Hope he’ll be as good a one as you were, old scout.”
“Thanks!” responded Alec, laughing. “How much do you want for handing me
that one, Chet? Can you change five cents?”
“At this moment,” replied Chester, “I couldn’t change a—Hello! look at
that!”
As he uttered the words, he leaned forward, pointing over Billy’s
shoulder. Alec, after one quick glance, threw out the clutch and jammed
on the emergency brake with such suddenness that Chester, caught
unprepared, tumbled back upon the seat. Before he had recovered from
this jolt, he saw Alec and Billy jump out of the auto and run swiftly
through the tall grass toward a railway track close to the road. Leaping
from the car he followed them at full speed.
The track at this point made a long curve preparatory to crossing a
narrow trestle over an inlet of the ocean, scarcely a hundred yards
distant from the spot where they had left the car. Not quite halfway
across the trestle, a girl, carrying a basket, was advancing, hurrying
over the ties, and behind her trotted a big shaggy dog. The three lads
had sprinted forward over a sandy embankment toward the track because
they heard, in the distance behind the girl, the sudden shrill whistle
of a locomotive and the rumble of an approaching train.
The girl also heard it, glanced back over her shoulder, and with a
shriek of terror, flung the basket aside and fled onward as fast as she
could run.
As the young Scouts dashed to the rescue, the ominous rumbling grew
louder and louder; the rails began to hum; then, with another warning
blast of the whistle, the freight train appeared around the bend and
thundered toward the long bridge.
Billy was the first to reach the end of the trestle toward which the
girl was coming rapidly. Running forward, leaping from one tie to
another, he realized how precarious was the footing, how easily one
misstep might hurl anyone into the depths below. Between the ties
underfoot he caught glimpses of the flashing green water swirling around
the upright piles as the tide flowed in, and, looking up, he could see
the strained, desperate expression on the girl’s white face.
“Don’t lose your nerve!” he called to her. “You’ll get across all
right.” He was not so confident as he appeared to be, but he knew
instinctively that she needed encouragement. “Come on, come on; but take
care!” he shouted. “We’re going to flag that train.”
Alec was close at his heels. Stripping off his coat and waving it
frantically, he overtook Billy just as young Worth, bounding forward,
almost collided with the girl and caught her outstretched hands in his
own. Some little distance behind them, Chester stood at the end of the
trestle, gazing with horror-stricken eyes at his friends and wondering
what was the best thing he could do at this crisis.
“Oh!” he groaned despairingly. “They’ll never stop it! They’ll all be
killed!”
Without waiting to see what progress Billy and the girl were making as
they turned and ran, Alec bounded forward for several yards, and stood
in the middle of the track until the train was almost upon him. Then,
with quick decision, he leaped to one side and flung himself down on the
ground.
The train passed him amid a whirl of dust and sand and small stones, and
in another minute it was out upon the bridge. Car after car thundered
past, with a deafening rumble of wheels. There was a sudden shriek and a
jar of the brakes being applied, but before the engine had come to a
standstill it had almost crossed the trestle.
Alec sprang to his feet before the train stopped. He looked wildly
around and back to the place where he had last seen Billy and the girl.
They had disappeared!
“What has happened?” he wondered, in a stupor of dread. “Did the train
hit them, or did they jump off the trestle into the water? I must go
back and find out! Oh, there’s Chester at the other end of the bridge.
He’s waving his arms and shouting.”
Alec wheeled and ran back swiftly down the track and out on the trestle.
The train blocked his way, but he climbed up a small iron ladder at the
rear of the last car, ran along the roofs of the cars, and dropped to
the ground just behind the tender, on the left side of the track. There,
stretched out flat on one of the ties, he peered over, and his eyes met
those of Billy Worth, full of the strain of waiting, upturned to his
face.
With one arm around the girl, whose arms clung about his neck, and the
other flung over one of the trestle rods under the track, Billy hung
there straight downward over the water fully twenty feet below. Alec saw
that Billy’s grip was weakening and that there was no time to lose.
Swiftly he twined his legs around the tie and lowered his body as far as
he could. Then he stretched out his arms; but it was not enough; he
could not reach the girl.