DICK FINDS A CANOE.
Dick had no definite plan in mind other than to proceed down the river
in search of their missing canoe. As Toma had suggested, there was a
possible chance that the unscrupulous Wolf Brennan and his partner had
set the craft adrift, believing that it would be carried by the current
into the Lake of Many Islands—out of sight and out of reach of their
three young opponents. If this was the plan that Wolf had actually put
into effect, there was still a frail chance for its recovery. It might
have floated out of the main current and subsequently been washed
ashore. If Dick were lucky, he might come upon it. It was a somewhat
hopeless quest yet, under the circumstances, it might be well worth the
effort.
“I won’t waste more than a few hours,” Dick decided, as he picked his
way along the rock-strewn shore. “If I don’t find it within five miles
from camp, I’ll give up.”
At the end of an hour, his patience was rewarded. Turning a bend in the
stream, his heart gave a quick leap. Two hundred yards ahead was what
looked to be very much like the thing he sought. It was a canoe—that
much he knew. It was close to shore, drifting idly, round and round a
circular pool on his own side of the river. He emitted a fervid sigh of
satisfaction and relief and bounded forward. Fifty feet from his
objective he stopped short, his breath catching.
It was not their canoe at all. It was the one in which only the day
before, he had seen Wolf Brennan and Toby McCallum pass by the island of
the dinosaur. The realization had come so unexpectedly that, for a time,
Dick was almost too dazed and bewildered to collect his scattered wits.
So Brennan and his partner had lost their canoe, too? How had that
happened? Had they left it partly in the water and partly on shore, and
had the current succeeded in tugging it away? It seemed probable. The
river played no favorites.
And then Dick saw something that caused his pulses to leap with
excitement. In the white sand, twenty feet from where the craft was
bobbing idly, were the marks made by the canoe when it had been beached,
and around these marks were the unmistakable imprints of moccasined
feet.
Dick could not suppress a grin of appreciation. Well-trained canoe that!
A very obliging current! Caught in a net-work of in-shore eddies, moving
round and round in a circle, the canoe was nearly as safe as if it had
been dragged clear of the water and deposited in the white sand along
the beach.
Coincident with this discovery, there came the realization that he was
treading on dangerous ground. Having left their canoe here, very
naturally the partners would return. Perhaps they already had. For all
Dick knew to the contrary, right at this moment from behind some leafy
ambuscade they might be watching his approach. The thought frightened
him. He paused dead in his tracks, undecided what to do. After the
reception Wolf had received back there at the boys’ camp, it was only
reasonable to suppose that neither of the partners would hesitate about
using their own weapons. On the other hand, if they were still lingering
in the vicinity of the other camp or had paused to rest somewhere, he
would be missing a golden opportunity if caution or the fear of a bullet
kept him from making a closer approach.
Come to think of it, he was in as much danger here, a mere fifty yards
from his goal, as he would be if he were actually at the side of the
canoe. Already he was within rifle range. But they hadn’t fired. Were
they waiting for him to come just a wee mite closer, or was it really
true that they hadn’t yet arrived upon the scene?
For a full minute Dick stood there, unable to decide. His heart pounded
like a trip-hammer. Three times he took a step forward and thrice he
stopped short, in panic at the thought of what might happen to him if he
could command the courage to go on.
And then, almost beside himself from the inactivity and suspense, he
gathered together the fluttering, loose ends of a waning decision,
gritted his teeth, and darted forward. Bounding along at top speed, in a
few seconds he came abreast of the canoe, checked himself, then splashed
out waist-deep into the water and clambered aboard.
He dropped his rifle, frantically seized one of the paddles and was half
way out into the river before he was sufficiently recovered from his
fright to realize that he had actually made good his escape. Yet he
continued to paddle furiously. Never before had he bucked a current with
such fierce and desperate ardor. He swept round the bend in the river,
perspiration pouring from every pore, working with a dogged, automatic,
machine-like regularity. Seemingly he could not, dare not ease up for
even as much as a split-second.
On and on he raced. A thin, white line of foam trailed off in his wake.
Now and again in his eager haste, his paddle scooped the water in the
air behind him, where the freshening breeze caught it and whirled it
away.
He was limp as a rag and utterly spent when he reached camp. Toma and
Sandy, who stood watching him as he glided up to shore, blinked in
amazement.
He had not the breath to answer their eager questions. He lay back in
the stern, puffing, gasping, while the blood throbbed in his head with
such insistence that for a time he actually believed that his temples
would burst. His vision was somewhat obscured, too. Through a sort of
haze he could perceive Sandy dancing wildly like a jungle savage.
“Dick, you lucky beggar!” shrieked the suddenly daft and madly plunging
young maniac. “What’s the meaning of this? O boy! Cracky! If you haven’t
turned the tables after all. What a come-back! I’ll bet if either one of
’em had gold teeth you’d have stolen them, too. Where’d you get it?”
Not yet able to speak intelligently, Dick pointed down the river.
“You did, eh?”
Dick nodded.
“Fight ’em?” Sandy persisted.
Dick shook his head.
“Well, that’s too bad. I was hoping that you had left them back there to
nurse a couple of broken heads. Serve ’em right after what they did to
our canoe.”
Dick sat up, his breathing now less violent.
“Ju—just what do you mean, Sandy? Have you found it?”
“You bet we have. Toma and I found it in your absence. It’s not down the
river at all. It’s over there in the brush, just where they carried it
after smashing it up with rocks. We must have slept like logs not to
have heard them.”
Dick thrust his two arms into the water over the side of the canoe and
commenced to bathe his hot, sweat-streaked face.
“Well, it doesn’t matter now. We have this.”
“Yes, thanks to you. What do you say we leave this accursed place before
something else happens? Toma and I can bring over the luggage while you
sit there and rest a bit. You need it. When we saw you first, I’m only
exaggerating a little when I say you were travelling at the rate of
twenty knots an hour.”
“I’ll admit I was frightened.”
“You must have been. Next time we want to get a little speed in a pinch,
I’m going to frighten you myself.”
“Cut out the talking, Sandy, and let’s start. I’m afraid to linger here
much longer. Don’t forget that we’ve stirred up a hornets’ nest by
taking a flying shot at Messrs. Brennan and McCallum, and now have added
insult to injury by appropriating their canoe.”
“Serves ’em right.”
“Please——”
Dick did not finish the sentence. A warning shout from Toma was followed
instantly by a sinister crack of a rifle and the whine of a bullet. The
young Indian came running, carrying part of the luggage. Dazed by the
suddenness of the attack, they could not determine at first from whence
the murderous leaden messenger had come. A second puff of smoke revealed
the place the two outlaws were hiding. Sitting in the canoe, Dick
returned their fire, while Sandy, strangely calm for him, sprang up the
bank to fetch what remained of their provisions.
When they were ready to embark, the firing had ceased. But it was only a
lull before the storm. Changing their position, this time creeping down
closer to the shore, Wolf Brennan and his companion blazed away at the
speeding, bobbing mark out there in the water. In order to save
themselves, the three boys dropped their paddles and sprawled at full
length in the bottom of the canoe.
“Whatever you do—keep down!” panted Dick.
Crack! Crack! Crack! Wood splintered around them. Running wild in the
current now, their craft started down stream. Suddenly, water commenced
pouring in through one side. They were sinking—and drifting as they
sank. Calm though he was, Dick had a feeling that they were
irretrievably lost. The water was like ice, chilling one to the marrow.
The opposite shore was still a long distance away.
“Be ready!” Dick called sharply. “Swim! Keep under as much as possible!”
Like a man dying, the canoe gurgled and went down. A bullet spat in the
water where it had been. A yell of triumph sounded from the shore.
“Dive!” shivered Dick. “We’ll make it!”