Marooned!
Bee, leaning against the wheel, whistled softly. Hal looked from the
idle engine to the green slopes of the island in deep disgust. Jack
swept his gaze up and down the shore. An hour ago there had been a
half-dozen sails in sight; now, save for a tug and a line of barges
afar out, and a four-masted schooner some five miles southward, not a
craft was in sight. Hal broke the silence first.
“This is a nice mess!” he exclaimed. “What shall we do?”
“I don’t believe there’s much we can do,” responded Jack. “I guess if
we wait long enough somebody’ll come along and give us a tow, but until
then about the only thing is sit down and be comfortable.” He acted on
his own suggestion. Hal looked for rescuers and found none.
“Who do you suppose stole our oars?” he growled.
“I’m inclined to suspect Honest Bill Glass,” replied Jack, with a
smile. “When a man begins by assuring you he’s honest it’s a good plan
to look out for him. I suppose we ought to have been more careful, but
nobody ever steals things around here――except some of the Portuguese
now and then. I wonder if Bill went aboard the sloop. If he did he
didn’t find much. He might take my slicker and the bedding in the cabin
and a few cooking things, though.”
“When we get back I mean to take a trip up the river and pay Bill Glass
a visit,” declared Hal. “Even if we don’t find the things I’ll have the
satisfaction of telling him what I think of him, the old pirate!”
“We might find out when he’s away and then go up there and make a
search,” suggested Bee. “Bill looks like a bad man to tackle.”
“I’m not afraid of him,” declared Hal. “We――we’ve got the law on our
side, too.”
“Well, we ought to have some proof first,” said Jack. “Guess we’d
better snoop around a bit before we say too much.”
After that silence fell over the _Corsair_ for a while. Then Bee
hazarded the theory that the _Corsair_ was drifting away from shore
and Jack untroubledly confirmed it. “Breeze and tide both against us,”
he said. “But somebody’s bound to be along pretty soon.”
“I hope so,” said Hal. “I’m getting hungry.”
Bee looked at his watch. “Most time for afternoon tea,” he agreed.
“Look here, Jack, how would it do if we took turns swimming and pulling
the launch after us?”
“We might do that if we had a quarter of a mile or so, to go,” answered
Jack, “but we’re a good two miles off shore now. We couldn’t do it,
Bee. If she keeps on in the direction she’s going she may go aground on
Hog Island after awhile.”
“Hog Island!” exclaimed Hal, glancing across the blue waters to where a
long, low stretch of brown rocks scantily crested with green showed to
the south. “Why, that’s three miles from here, isn’t it?”
“About that. But we’re drifting pretty fast. We ought to do it in a
couple of hours, unless someone gives us a tow first.”
“I don’t see that we’d be much better off there,” said Bee. “There’s
nothing to eat on Hog Island, is there?”
“Well, you might find some of those gull eggs you wanted to sample,”
replied Jack with a smile. “Anyhow, it would be better than drifting
around all night in this craft.”
Hal shuddered. “It’s getting rougher, too,” he said.
“Yes, the breeze is freshening a little. Maybe, though, it’ll work
around to the eastward toward sunset. If it does we stand a show to
drift on shore farther down the coast. Kind of funny there are no boats
around today.”
“I suppose if we didn’t want one the place would be full of them,” said
Hal disgustedly. “We’re opposite the island now, Jack.”
“Yes, this breeze is sending us along fairly well. Ever think of having
a small mast, Hal, so you could sail her if you had to?”
“No, but I believe I will――if I ever get back. I’ve seen them on
launches.”
“They’re handy at times,” agreed Jack.
The conversation dwindled again. Presently Jack went to the wheel and
turned the rudder hard aport, as he did so looking ahead at Hog Island,
which was already perceptibly nearer.
“If we had that boat-hook,” he remarked, “we might set up a distress
signal. As it is, I don’t see how we can. I guess the best thing is to
try and make Hog Island. That’s land, anyway. And there used to be a
little stone hut there, although I believe the roof was gone when I saw
it last. Years ago they used to go out to the island and gather kelp
and some of the men built a hut to sleep in in case a blow came up.”
“You don’t happen to know of an island around here that has a hotel on
it, do you?” asked Bee plaintively. “I’d just dearly love a thick steak
and a baked potato and――”
“Cut it out!” groaned Hal. “If you can’t talk sense, Bee, keep still.
You evidently think this is a joke!”
“There’s a schooner,” exclaimed Jack, “but I guess she’s headed down
the coast. See her? She’s just come around the Head.”
The others looked in the direction of Jack’s finger and saw her. But
when she had caught the breeze she pointed her nose to the southwest
and grew smaller. The sun was nearing the hills to the west and the
long beams fell across the water dazzlingly. The breeze strengthened
and the surface became more choppy, the _Corsair_ dipping and tossing
as she drifted seaward.
“Do you think we’ll make Hog Island?” asked Hal anxiously after awhile.
“Looks now as though we’d either bump into it or go by just inside,”
answered Jack. “If we get within a hundred yards or so I guess we can
make it. How are you at swimming, Hal?”
“I once swam sixty strokes,” replied Hal with a smile, “but it nearly
did me up!”
“And lived right on the ocean all your life!” marvelled Bee. “Thunder!
Why, I never saw anything bigger than a mill-pond when I was a kid and
I’ve swam――swum――swimmed――say, which is it, anyway?――swammed a half a
mile lots of times.”
“Then,” said Jack, “as it looks now as if we’d pass the island if the
_Corsair’s_ let alone, you and I may have to go overboard and try
towing, suppose we get our clothes off, Bee.”
Twenty minutes later it was certain that the launch, left to her own
devices, would pass inside Hog Island and continue out to sea. Jack
watched the end of the rock draw abreast some seventy or eighty yards
away. About midway of its length a small promontory jutted out on the
shoreward side, and just before the _Corsair_ drew even with this
Jack gave the word and plunged overboard, slicing down into the green
water in a beautiful dive and reappearing at the nose of the launch,
shaking the drops from his eyes. Bee tried to emulate that dive, but
his disappearance was more of a splash, and when he came up he was
sputtering wildly. However, Bee could swim if he wasn’t a master of
the art of diving, and when he laid hold of one side of the rope and
Jack took a grip farther ahead and they struck out the _Corsair_,
obediently, if slowly, swung her nose toward the island. Once started
she seemed glad to seek port, and in a few minutes Jack was carefully
seeking foothold on the ledge.
“You’d better stay in the water, Bee, until I find a place to land.
These rocks are terribly sharp. Pull on the line some more. That’s
enough. Heave your anchor over, Hal. Does she hold? Good enough. Now,
Bee, we’ll pull her in over this way so Hal can step ashore.”
Five minutes later the _Corsair_ was anchored in the protection of the
little promontory, with the line from the bow tied to a rock on shore,
and Bee and Jack, dried by the breeze, were getting into their clothes
again. Hal waited for them, gazing the while disconsolately across
two miles of water to where Greenhaven Neck stretched itself against
the coppery glow of the sunset. As he looked, the light on Popple Head
began its vigil and a weak white gleam reached him as the revolving
rays pointed eastward. Hal heartily wished himself on the mainland just
then.
“Now,” said Jack, buttoning his jacket across his chest and shivering a
little, “we’ll see if that hut is still here.”
Hog Island was only a long and narrow reef, the highest point of which
lay at high tide scarcely ten or twelve feet above the water. The
broadest place was at the northern end, and here, under the lee of a
ledge, the boys found the stone hut. It was a rough structure at the
best, the builders having possessed, it seemed, but little skill in
masonry, but the walls were rain-proof and, perhaps, wind-proof, and
had there been a roof overhead it would have made a very acceptable
shelter. A few loose planks, heavy enough to have withstood the gales,
still rested across the top of the four walls, and these the boys
shifted until they were side by side at the back. Other planks, of oak
and apparently at one time parts of a ship’s hull, were scattered
nearby, and it took the three but a few minutes to lift them back to
their places. Smaller pieces of driftwood, gathered from between the
ledges, were laid over the interstices and the shipwrecked mariners
viewed the result with elation.
“Now it may rain if it wants to,” said Hal.
“It won’t rain,” said Jack, “but it’s going to blow some harder before
morning.” He held his hand up and wriggled his fingers, finally rubbing
them together.
“Blessed if he isn’t feeling of the weather, Hal!” laughed Bee. “Can
you tell what it’s going to do that way, Jack?”
Jack smiled. “I don’t suppose I can,” he replied. “Not really, that is.
But sometimes I think I can. It’s a trick I caught from my father. He
could tell what the weather was going to be two days ahead. Now we’d
better hustle around and build a fire; two fires, in fact. We’ll build
one about the middle of the island, on the highest point, as a signal,
and we’ll have one here near the door of our castle to keep us warm. I
hope there’s plenty of driftwood. If there isn’t we may have to burn
our roof up.”
By this time it was twilight and Popple Head Light glared across at
them at intervals as though trying to make out what they were up to.
There was plenty of small wood above high-water line, left there by the
winter gales, and soon a good-sized beacon was blazing.
“I don’t know whether anyone will see that or know what it means if
they do see it,” said Jack, “but it’s worth trying. Now we’ll pile some
more wood here so we can keep it going until bedtime and then we’ll
carry some back to the hut.”
By the time the second fire was lighted the boys were ready to sit down
and rest. The flames threw a ruddy light into the little hut and the
three seated themselves just inside the doorway, out of the wind, which
was now blowing sharply from the northeast, and discussed their chances
of being rescued.
[Illustration: MAROONED.]
“If Captain Horace sees that,” said Jack, “he may send out to see
what’s up. The trouble is, though, that in the summer campers come out
here sometimes, and he might think we were campers.”
“Who’s Captain Horace?” asked Hal.
“Captain Horace Tucker. He keeps the light. He’s a sort of uncle of
mine.”
“I wouldn’t care a bit if I only had something to eat,” sighed Bee. “I
think it’s rather jolly out here; this hut and the fire and――and all;
but I surely would like to see a large, juicy sirloin steak walk around
the corner!”
“How about gull eggs, Jack?” asked Hal. “Would they be any good?”
“Well, maybe they’d taste better than nothing in the morning, but I
don’t believe we’re hungry enough to eat them yet. They’re pretty
strong, Hal. Besides, I didn’t see any nests, did you?”
“No, but I wasn’t looking for them.”
“Well, I was, and I didn’t see one. Maybe in the morning, when it’s
lighter, we can come across some. I have an idea, though, that gulls
lay their eggs a good deal earlier than this.”
“Couldn’t eat a gull, could we?” asked Bee hopefully.
“No, not unless we were actually starving,” laughed Jack. “Then we’d
get about the same effect by soaking our belts in salt water and eating
those. By the way, Hal, have you any fishing tackle on the launch?”
“Not a thing――” began Hal. But Bee interrupted.
“Sure we have, Hal! We stowed our lines and hooks in the stern closet
this morning, don’t you remember?”
“The ‘stern closet’ is good, Bee,” Jack laughed. “Well, that means we
may have some breakfast if someone doesn’t take us off before.”
“Maybe old Honest Bill Glass swiped those things too,” said Hal.
“How could he when we used them this morning?” demanded Bee. “Don’t be
a chump, old Hal! But say, Jack, we haven’t any bait. There was just a
little left and I threw it away.”
“Mussels will do,” replied Jack. “Of course I don’t promise we’ll catch
anything; sometimes you just simply can’t when you need to very badly;
but we’ll have a try. And you don’t feel quite so hungry now if you
know there’s a breakfast coming later.”
Bee sighed dolefully. “I’d swap that breakfast gladly for a light
supper,” he said. “Let’s go to sleep, fellows. Maybe we can forget
we’re starving to death.”
But they didn’t retire quite yet. The signal fire had to be replenished
first and they all stumbled back to it over the rocks and threw more
wood on, sending the crimson sparks flying far on the wind. Across
the dark water the lights on Greenhaven Neck gleamed faintly and the
white eye of the lighthouse seemed to follow them as they retraced
their steps to the hut. They built up the fire at the doorway and then
settled down for the night, lying side by side for warmth, against the
more sheltered wall of the hut. For a while they talked, more and more
drowsily every minute, with the sound of the waves and the whistle of
the wind in their ears. But the day had been a busy one and all were
thoroughly tired and presently one by one they dropped off to slumber.