A LITTLE LUNCHEON ON THE _ELIAS WARD_
One could almost hear the creaking of knee and elbow joints when the
five boys turned out the next morning. Despite Hal’s prediction, this
was at an early hour. For, while the sea was yet running before the
remnant of the wind, the sun came up on a cloudless sky. Captain Joe’s
clothes dryer had worked splendidly, and by seven thirty o’clock, the
rescuing crew was itself again――refreshed and reclothed.
Before breakfast, Captain Joe and Tom visited both the captain and
the owner of the steamer’s cargo. They reported these facts: The
vessel was the _Elias Ward_, of Charleston, South Carolina――800 tons
gross, and commanded by Captain Martin Hobson, of St. Augustine. It
had been chartered by W. L. Hawkins, a lumber dealer from Michigan,
for a trading cruise in the West Indies, mainly to secure San Domingo
mahogany in Hayti. In this, it had been wholly successful.
“Captain Hobson,” explained Tom, “don’t know what’s happened――he’s
wanderin’ in his head. We gave him some water, but we don’t know
whether he ought to be fed. Mr. Hawkins can’t get out o’ his bunk. But
he’s takin’ medicine.”
“Well,” asked Mac, “since we’ve got two sick ones aboard, what’s next?
Are you kids goin’ on to the Anclote Club house?”
The other boys looked about with puzzled expressions. Captain Joe
answered by shaking his head.
“Not dis week,” he announced positively. “We make breakfast, then work.
There is plenty coal. Get up steam, and start de pumps. In half hour,
in the _Three Sisters_, I go to Pensacola. To-night, I return with tug.
We tow de steamer to Pensacola.”
“We all got to go back?” began Hal, with a half wail.
“Certain’,” went on Captain Joe. “We not leave the steamer now.”
“Why not?” began Bob. “That is, as soon as Mr. Hawkins is well enough
to take charge. She’s all right here. We can telephone for a tug from
Mill View.”
Tom’s face showed a strange smile. He looked at Captain Joe, and the
smile broadened into a grin. Then he beckoned the other boys closer.
“Why not?” he repeated. “For one reason, she’s too valuable.”
Mac suddenly slapped his knee and let out a yell.
“By cracky,” he shouted. “I hadn’t thought of that. What’s she worth,
Captain Joe?”
Captain Joe was smiling too, but he only answered:
“She good money.”
Hal and Bob were still puzzled.
“Don’t you understand?” exclaimed Tom. “We’ve saved this craft. We’re
going to land her safely in port, and then――”
“The court’ll give us a good part of her value as salvage,” concluded
Mac. “We’ve earned it, and we’re all a goin’ to be rich.”
The opening of the club house would have to be postponed a week.
Breakfast was cooked, the captain and the cargo owner made as
comfortable as possible――the latter also being notified of the program
of his rescuers――fire was started to provide steam for the pump, and
then an examination was made of the cargo.
The boys did not ask Mr. Hawkins the value of his freight, and he
volunteered no information. But, whatever its value, the entire hold
was packed with squared mahogany logs. There were also a few other logs
of lesser size.
“This stuff is worth a good deal, isn’t it?” asked Bob, as the boys
surveyed the heavy, curiously marked logs.
“That depends,” answered Mac――wise in all things pertaining to shipping
or the sea trade of Pensacola. “If these sticks came from Central
America, they ain’t so much. I’ve seen mahogany ’at didn’t bring more’n
ten dollars a log. Wa’n’t wuth much more’n cedar. But,” and he closed
an eye, “ef they’s San Domingo logs, an’ the geezer ’at owns ’em says
they is, I seen one o’ that kind sell right on the dock in Pensacola
fur a thousan’ bones. Them thousand dollar boys is what they shave up
fur veneer――all curly and wriggly.”
“A thousand dollars apiece?” exclaimed Hal.
“I ain’t sayin’ that,” explained the knowing Mac, “but even ef they’s
one ur two o’ that sort in the bunch, we ain’t been workin’ fur
nothin’.”
“Do you mean to say,” broke in Bob, “that whoever owns this boat and
the man ’at owns these logs has to pay us the price o’ them for savin’
’em?”
“No,” explained Tom, breaking in; “but they pay part of the value of
both――depends on the risk the rescuers took, and whethah the wreck
would have been a loss without theah assistance. Sometimes, it’s
half――sometimes less――an’ sometimes more.”
“Does I git any sheer ef yo’ all gits paid?” broke in Jerry Blossom
suddenly.
“My own judgment,” Tom answered, “is that every one ought to share
alike. That means Captain Joe, Jerry and all the rest. I don’t know by
rights if we ought really to set up any claims――but if we do, let’s all
share alike.”
“Not set up any claims!” exclaimed Mac belligerently. “An’ why not?
They wouldn’t been a stick o’ this timber saved, ef it hadn’t been
for the old _Escambia_. An’ the steamer ’at carried it would ’a been
suckin’ sand on the bar afore this.”
“Yas, sah,” spoke up Jerry. “Ah’s done heered ’bout dat what yo’ call
’em. De law makes yo’ take him――yo’ all ain’t got no choice.”
“What do _you_ say, Captain Joe?” asked Tom.
“De man you wuk fo’ gets de money. ’Tain’t none mine.”
“I vote we put in a claim,” spoke up Hal, “and that we divide whatever
we get into six piles――”
“I shorely done take a big risk,” broke in Jerry. “We all boun’ to git
big pay. I kin use de money. Dese clothes――”
“Say, Kids,” interrupted Hal, his face lighting up with enthusiasm,
“we’ll put our money together, and buy a good cruising yacht, and then
we can surely go to Anclote Island――”
“Ah’s gwine to need all my sheer,” objected Jerry, in some alarm.
“I meant the Anclote Club members, Jerry,” explained Hal, laughing.
But instantly his laugh died out. As he realized what he had said, Mac,
the “expelled” member, shifted uneasily. The latter said nothing, but
the boys looked with embarrassment at each other. There was a quick
whispered conversation and then Tom said:
“Mac, after last night, we think everybody ought to kind o’ forget our
row. I reckon you’d vote for Bob now, an’ he ain’t nothin’ against you.
We’ve taken back what we did, and you all are a membah again――if you
want to be.”
Mac’s years of “toughness” and his bullying life had hardened him until
he had no way of showing what was in his heart. But the other boys
understood. Bob, especially, knew that Mac was genuinely sorry.
“Sure we will,” was Mac’s only response, “an’ we’ll git a bird. The
stuff under our feet ain’t worth a cent less’n twenty thousand dollars
to say nothin’ o’ the vessel itself. They can’t offer us less’n half.
How much is that apiece?” he added, anxious to show no weakness over
his reelection.
“A sixth of ten thousand dollars,” replied Hal promptly, “is one
thousand six hundred and sixty-six dollars. Leavin’ Jerry and Captain
Joe out, we’ll have six thousand six hundred and sixty-four dollars.”
Bob touched Hal on the shoulder, and the two boys stepped aside for a
few moments. When they returned, Bob said smiling:
“Look here, boys, what’s the use o’ mincin’ words. We don’t want to
hurt anybody’s feelin’s, but Hal and I are goin’ to speak right out.”
Captain Joe and Jerry had withdrawn to attend the newly-made fires in
the engine room. “It ain’t because we ever did anything to deserve it,
but our fathers are what you call rich men. And you fellows haven’t
any fathers. If this thing figures out as big as we’re calculatin’, Hal
and I want to buy the yacht――we’ll have enough.”
Mac said nothing, but Tom began shaking his head.
“Then we won’t go in it,” added Bob stoutly. “If we can’t do it all, we
won’t do anything.”
“Let’s see how things turn out,” suggested Mac as a compromise.
With this, the other boys had to be satisfied. As soon as the pumps
were working, Jerry taking the first turn at stoking, Mac and the other
boys took Captain Joe to the _Three Sisters_ in the _Escambia_. The
camp equipment, the provisions and the tent outfit on the beach were
then conveyed to the steamer, hauled on deck and, a little after eight
o’clock, Captain Joe and Hal were tacking out of the tortuous Perdido
Channel on their way to Pensacola.
There was a fresh breeze, and in an hour, the schooner was only a speck
in the east. The boys left aboard the _Elias Ward_ had enough to do.
Spreading and drying the camp equipment took some time. Then there
were visits to the helpless captain and Mr. Hawkins, and Jerry had
to be relieved. At the first opportunity, Jerry and Mac boarded the
_Escambia_, and in an hour, they returned with a half dozen red fish, a
pail of crabs and a basket of oysters.
This made luncheon an event. Jerry’s assistance in the galley did not
extend to the cooking, but he cleaned the fish and searched through
the captain’s cabin until he had collected dishes, knives and forks
sufficient for the noonday meal. Mac was the cook, and there was no
question about his success. The day turned out fair. Toward noon, the
wind died away, and the sun shone with springtime warmth.
Bob was a little stiff, but he carried no other evidences of his
vigorous participation in the strenuous rescue. Just before noon, Mr.
Hawkins appeared on deck. He showed the effects of the strain under
which he had labored, but he was wonderfully improved. Until luncheon,
he gave his time to Captain Hobson. Both Bob and Tom insisted on
interfering with Chef Mac, but the only substantial contribution they
made to the approaching meal was a dessert of fresh pineapples, of
which they found an ample quantity aboard.
Captain Hobson’s dining room was just forward of the wheel. A skylight
gave it ample sunshine and air. Here Jerry arranged the table, and
luncheon was served. Bob and Tom protested over Mac’s long delay, but
at last, about one o’clock, Mr. Hawkins was summoned, and with Jerry
acting as waiter, the three boys and their guest sat down to a meal
that was compensation for the long wait.
In the center of the table was a pyramid of luscious sugar pines,
ripened in the tropics and not in shipping crates. Piled among the
green waxen tops of these, were little “lady finger” bananas, such as
cannot be shipped to the north, and oranges whose fragrance filled the
saloon. In front of this “set piece” was a big glass bowl of shredded
pineapple, swimming in its own piquant juice, unprofaned with sugar. At
the other end of the table was a pitcher of iceless but none the less
palatable lemonade――Bob’s work.
“More like a fruit salad,” remarked Mr. Hawkins, as he examined the
contents of the pitcher and made out the flavoring slices of oranges
and pineapples. “Funny the cook of the steamer couldn’t think of
something like this.”
Jerry then served the following menu:
Oysters on the shell with lemon
Oyster Stew
Boiled Hard Shell Crabs with Red Pepper
Fried Red Fish
Hot Baked Beans
Stewed Corn
Ship’s Biscuits
Shredded Pineapple
Black Coffee
“Boys,” said the Michigan lumber dealer an hour later, as he left the
table, “I never had a meal like that in Chicago. Do you cook like that
in the camp you’ve been telling about?”
Mac laughed. “You bet your life,” he answered. “Why not? That’s why we
hang out around here. And if we were in camp a month, I reckon we could
have a different sort of fish every day.”
About three-thirty o’clock, a cloud of black smoke out in the gulf
told that Captain Joe and Hal had lost no time, and at four-fifteen,
the ocean tug _Sea Fox_ made fast to the anchored steamer. Captain Joe
had made his bargain at the tug office, and there was nothing to cause
delay. Had there been a supply of gasoline, Mac would have remained
behind and gone on the _Escambia_ to the club house. But, after a
filial conference, the life boat was made fast to the steamer, and the
tug crew clambered aboard and raised the _Ward’s_ anchor.
Hawsers were passed aboard, and Captain Joe, who had left the _Three
Sisters_ in Pensacola and returned with Hal on the tug, took the wheel.
The stout little tug then fell to her work, and with straining cables,
sharp commands back and forth between Captain Joe and the skipper of
the _Sea Fox_, the rescued steamer was got slowly about and headed out
the pass. A quarter of an hour later, the smoke hidden sea tug, with
its deep laden tow far astern was well on her way to Pensacola Bay.
When the _Elias Ward’s_ “mud hook” dropped again, it was nearly
midnight. One man was watching and waiting on the Long Wharf in
Pensacola, for the incoming steamer, and, while the _Sea Fox_ was yet
casting off her hawsers, the skiff of a vigilant reporter hurried
alongside.
“Captain Joe,” shouted the enterprising young journalist, as he
scrambled up the steamer’s ladder, “get a move on――it’s nearly
midnight, and them dead ones over at the tug office don’t know a thing.
Gimme the story in rag time.”
And, before the boys could work out any plans for the remainder of
the night, the members of the Anclote Boat Club had to tell, for the
Pensacola _Journal_, the full story of the _Elias Ward’s_ rescue.
“Are you goin’ to print all that?” asked Bob innocently, at last.
“Am I?” laughed the reporter, hurrying over the side. “Just you read
the _Journal_ in the morning, and see. Sorry it’s too dark for snaps.
Good night, kids. See you to-morrow.”