A Rescue
Jack jumped to his feet, dropping two of Aunt Mercy’s best doughnuts,
and looked about him. The hail came again and Jack saw Desco Benton
waving from the _Hetty and Grace_.
“Right-o!” he called, and quickly cast loose. It took the _Crystal
Spring_ almost five minutes to half drift and half sail across to the
hand-liner, and all the way Jack wondered what Desco wanted of him.
When he was alongside the master of the _Hetty and Grace_ appeared at
the rail again.
“Where you been, Jack?” he growled. “I been waitin’ all the mornin’ for
you.”
“I’m sorry, Desco. I saw the other boat putting out to you and I
thought you’d got water.”
“Them Portuguese? Oh, I sent ’em off in a hurry. That stuff they pump
ain’t water, it’s pizen. One of ’em says to me awhile back, he says,
‘Cap’n, this water’s the finest spring water in Greenhaven.’ ‘Spring
water’ says I. ‘Spring water! If it is it’s _last_ Spring water!’” And
Desco leaned on the rail and laughed hoarsely at his joke. “Where’d
they get that stuff, Jack?”
“Right out of the hydrant at the landing,” replied Jack with a smile.
“I guess it’s all right when there isn’t a break in the main, but there
usually is. Then it’s about the color of pea soup. Have a good trip,
Desco?”
“Fair to middlin’! I landed ’em down to Boston. Here, give me hold o’
that pipe. How you gettin’ on, Jack?”
“About the same way――fair to middling,” answered Jack as he uncoiled
the hose. “There isn’t much doing just now. Folsom’s boats get their
water at the wharves these days. They had a pipe put in. I suppose it’s
cheaper for them that way.”
“Huh, I cal’ate it is. An’ Folsom never was a man to waste money.
Cal’ate that’s how he’s come by so much on it. I got two butts ’most
empty, Jack, and the deck cask, too. Here, Manuel, lug this down to the
butts and sing out when you’re ready.”
While Jack pumped the master of the _Hetty and Grace_ leaned across
the rail and talked. He was a big, broad-shouldered, yellow-bearded
Nova Scotian, of thirty-five or thirty-six years, a good sailor and a
lucky master. Desco Benton’s luck was proverbial around Greenhaven and
it had stood him in good stead many times. “As lucky as Desco Benton”
was a common saying among the fishermen. The _Hetty and Grace_ was a
small but staunch little knockabout schooner, Essex built, with the
lines of a pleasure yacht. Desco owned every plank and nail in her and
was immensely proud of her. She could sail, too. That fact had been
demonstrated two years before when Desco had beaten every schooner in
the fisherman’s race to Boston Light and back, having his anchor down
and all sails snug when his nearest competitor came racing around the
breakwater.
“How’s your folks?” he asked presently. “I cal’ate that sister o’ yours
is quite grown up by now.”
“Faith’s thirteen, I guess,” Jack replied as he worked at the long pump
handle. “She’s going to high school.”
“I want to know! An’ how about you, Jack? Wasn’t you in high school,
too?”
“Last year. I had to quit when father died. Someone had to make some
money and it looked like it was up to me.”
“Of course. Well, edication’s a good thing, I cal’ate, though I never
had much time for it, but it don’t butter no parsnips, Jack.”
“I’m going back some day, I expect. I want to, anyway. I want to go to
college if I can, too. Looks now, though, as if I might be pretty old
before that happens.”
“College, eh? H’m; I had a feller sailin’ with me a couple o’ years
back that was a college grad-oo-ate; name o’ Jasper Fitzwilliam. He
wan’t no good at all. But I cal’ate there’s a difference in ’em. I
cal’ate that young Folsom’ll have a college edication. I passed him
comin’ in, him an’ another boy. They was in a motor-boat about half a
mile off The Lump. Seemed to be hove to off there an’ I cal’ate they
was fishin’. He’ll be a rich man some day, when his dad dies, eh?”
“I suppose so. He seems a nice chap. He was in my class at high school
last year, though I didn’t know him very well. Funny place to fish, off
The Lump, Desco. I never heard of anyone catching anything there, did
you?”
Desco shook his head as the signal came to stop pumping. The sailor
crawled up through the hatch with the hose and Desco bade him lug it
forward to the small butt lashed by the deck-house. Jack began his
labors again. Desco, his gaze fixed on the western sky, where a few
white clouds like great bunches of cotton batting were creeping up,
pointed with the stem of his pipe.
“There’s goin’ to be a thunder squall before long, Jack,” he said.
“Better get your slicker out.”
Jack looked and nodded. “It feels like it too,” he answered. “I’d just
as lief it didn’t come till I get this old lugger back to the Cove.”
There was a yell from the sailor at the hose and Jack stopped pumping.
A few minutes later Desco dropped Jack’s line to the deck of the water
boat and Jack, pushing the boom out, took the tiller again and waved
good-bye to the master of the _Hetty and Grace_.
For two hours or more he cruised slowly about the harbor without doing
any business. It was almost four o’clock, and the _Crystal Spring_ was
ambling along just inside Gull Island, when Jack saw the lighthouse
tender push her snub nose around the breakwater and turn sharp into
the narrow channel. The tender usually bought water when she visited
Greenhaven, and Jack, casting an anxious backward glance in search of
the _Morning Star_, hustled the _Crystal Spring_ all he knew how. The
lighthouse tender was already out of sight behind the island, although
Jack could see the tips of her masts above the buildings. His first
tack took him to the end of the breakwater. Then, as the water boat
came around, he saw that the tender already had her mud-hook down.
The _Morning Star_, it seemed, had for once been caught napping, and
Jack smiled as he pushed the sloop along. But the smile faded a moment
later, for around the farther end of the island sped the _Morning
Star_, her eight horsepower engine puffing away at full speed. Had
the _Crystal Spring_ been similarly equipped it might have proved a
very pretty race, but as it was the _Morning Star_ had everything her
own way. Before Jack had covered half the distance between him and
the tender, the _Morning Star_ was alongside the government boat. A
moment later lines were passed aboard and the two Lampron brothers
were manning the pump. As the _Crystal Spring_ sailed by Tony Lampron
grinned across at Jack and shouted, “Where you been some time, eh,
Mister?” and his brother Frank waved a hand and laughed. Jack made no
sign, but he was angry and disappointed, and at the end of the island
he swung the _Crystal Spring_ around and headed up the channel for
home. It wasn’t likely that there would be any more business today. And
he didn’t much care, anyhow. Besides, the thunder storm that Desco had
predicted was almost at hand, and Jack could see by the angry streaky
look of the clouds that there would be wind as well as rain. He didn’t
care to be caught outside in a blow. The _Crystal Spring_ was staunch
enough but she was anything but dry in dirty weather. Jack resolved to
get around Popple Head and at least under the lee of the Neck before
the storm burst.
To be on the safe side, however, for already the thunder was rumbling,
he kicked down the latch of a little locker under the poop and pulled
out a yellow oilskin coat and hat. He substituted his shoes and
stockings for the oilskins and slammed the locker door shut again
just as the sharp detonations of an engine exhaust reached him. A
stone-throw to leeward Charley Paige, leaning against the tiller of
his little power boat, waved to him and pointed westward. Jack waved
back and, nodding his head, luffed the _Crystal Spring_ around through
the swell of the fisherman and headed along the breakwater. The breeze
had grown flukey and of a sudden a great gray cloud passed over the
sun and the ocean darkened to steel color. A clap of thunder broke
overhead. A puff of wind came out of the west and the boom went down as
the first puff of the squall caught the big sail. Then came a drop of
rain and Jack, straddling the tiller, donned his oilskins, buttoning
the long coat closely about him, and pulled the sou’easter down over
his head. It was evident that he was in for a wetting after all.
The _Crystal Spring_ began to roll as the wind increased, behaving in
a most frolicsome, undignified manner. Half-way between the beacon and
the lighthouse point the rain began in earnest, slanting out of the
west and pelting at Jack’s back vindictively. There was quite a sea by
now, although the rain flattened the surface somewhat and the squall
blew the tops of the waves into spume. Jack, finding himself in for it,
began to whistle tunelessly, leaning against the tiller and peering
out from under the brim of his sou’easter. It was too thick to see
very far ahead and it behooved him to be watchful, since a fisherman
might be beating his way in around Popple Head. But he sighted nothing
and the lighthouse was abeam and he brought the sloop’s blunt nose
around. In another minute he would be in the lee of the shore and well
out of some nasty weather. The thunder still crashed at intervals and
now and then the dun clouds were rent asunder by the livid flashes of
lightning. The lighthouse dropped astern and the _Crystal Spring_, with
a final impatient roll, settled back on an evener keel. And at that
moment, following a crash of thunder, Jack heard a faint hail.
He shaded his eyes with his hand and peered shoreward. But as far
as he could see there was no one in sight. He had about reached the
conclusion that he had been mistaken when the hail came again, a mere
atom of sound above the rush of rain and sea and the creaking complaint
of the sloop’s timbers. Jack turned seaward and strained his eyes
through the murk. At first only a blank gray wall of mist rewarded him,
but as his gaze accustomed itself to the task, suddenly a darker blur,
something neither rain nor sea, came to his vision for a moment and
then was lost again. Half doubting, Jack hauled on the sheet and jammed
the helm to starboard. The _Crystal Spring_ came about with a resentful
lunge that sent the water in her big tank swashing noisily from side to
side. With his eyes fixed ahead Jack gave the sloop all she could carry
and in a moment the squall caught her again as she passed out of the
lee of the land and dipped the end of the long boom in the racing sea.
Again came the hail, clearer this time, and seemingly from off the port
bow.
Jack moved the tiller a little, peering out from under the sail. And
then, almost ahead, a small boat jumped into view, a tiny craft with
two figures huddled in her. Jack shouted a response and kept on, and
as the _Crystal Spring_ staggered past the smaller craft he saw that
the latter was a motor boat, perhaps not over eighteen feet long,
apparently broken down. In another moment she was lost to sight. It was
no easy matter to bring the water boat’s head into the wind and fully
five minutes passed before Jack, allowing for the drift, sighted the
launch again. Then, steadying the _Crystal Spring_ as best he could,
he bore up to the disabled boat and made a trumpet of his hands.
“Stand by to catch a rope!” he shouted. There was a faint response from
the launch and Jack, seizing a coil of half-inch rope from the locker,
snagged the tiller with his knee and got ready to throw. The sloop
wallowed up to within a dozen feet of the launch and with a sweep of
his arm sent the coil hurtling across the water. It was a lucky throw
and as the _Crystal Spring_ went by Jack saw one of the occupants seize
the rope.
“Make fast to the bow cleat,” he shouted back, “and haul in!”
A figure moved cautiously along the pit of the tossing launch, crawled
to the deck and with fumbling fingers tied the line to the cleat.
The launch had been drifting stern foremost and now Jack brought the
_Crystal Spring_ around so that the launch might come up under her
lee. Aboard the latter they were hauling valiantly and in a minute the
little motor boat was alongside and the occupants were climbing aboard
the sloop. They were sorry-looking mariners. Both appeared to be boys
of about Jack’s age. Neither wore oilskins and their blue serge suits
were soaked through and through. One of the boys had lost his cap and
his hair was plastered tightly to his head.
“Bring that slack with you,” Jack directed, “and make the line fast to
that cleat there. That’s the ticket. Now then, I’ll have you ashore
in a minute or two, but you’ll find a couple of blankets in the bunk
for’ard if you want them. Open that for’ard hatch and you’ll see them.”
But the boys shook their heads as they sank to the cockpit. “We can’t
get――any wetter,” said one. “We’re terribly much obliged――to you for――”
He paused, and then, “Why, it’s Jack Herrick, isn’t it?” he exclaimed.
Jack nodded as he gazed ahead in search of the Cove.
“That’s me. And you’re Harry Folsom. Catch any fish?”