That night the wreck was found. Seated in the cabin, close beside the
telephone that led over the side down to the divers toiling beneath the
darkening water, Caruth received the thrilling news.
Instantly hoarse orders rang through the ship, and the crew sprang to
their stations. The furnace doors were flung open and brawny stokers
hurled coal upon the banked fires until the hiss of steam told that the
_Sea Spume_ was ready to race for the open sea the moment the gold was
on board.
Below, the divers were picking their way over the sunken hull, seeking
the storage place of the treasure.
Above, at the telephones, stood Caruth and Marie Fitzhugh, cheeks
flushed and eyes a-sparkle.
“At last! At last!” breathed the girl; and “At last! At last!” echoed
Caruth.
His tones penetrated to the girl’s consciousness, and she blushed
brightly. In the triumph of her cause, she had forgotten that Caruth’s
object and hers were not the same.
She blushed, but she did not draw away. After all, if she were fated
to give herself for Russia, to sell herself to Caruth in return for
his help in the cause of freedom, the sacrifice would not be so very
hard. Indeed, it might not be hard at all. If policy were to govern
her mating, this clean-limbed, clean-thinking young American would
be a better mate than many a one who had sought her in the past. The
Brotherhood must decide; she had sworn herself body and soul to its
orders; but she found herself suddenly hoping that the Brotherhood
might find Caruth’s claims worthy.
Smilingly she looked into the young man’s eyes. “Not yet,” she
murmured. “Not yet. We are not out of the woods yet, and until we are
you must remember your promise.”
“My promise?”
“To give all your thoughts to the business in hand. Not to make love to
me. Not to----”
“Great Cæsar’s Ghost! You don’t call this making love, do you? With you
half a mile away across the cabin, and me with this telephone harness
on my head. Just you wait and----” Excitedly he devoured her with his
eyes.
Brightly she blushed, and restlessly she moved. Then she pressed a
button on the wall. “I am going to send for Mr. Wilkins and Miss
Shishkin to come and hear the news with us,” she explained. “We owe Mr.
Wilkins an apology for distrusting him.”
When the steward entered, she sent him to find the two and ask them to
come to the cabin.
When the man had gone, Caruth looked at her and laughed. “Yes,” he
agreed, “I guess I owe Wilkins an apology, but I could make it later
just as well as now. I’m inclined to think that Miss Shishkin has had
more to do with his good faith than anything else, anyhow. Queer girl,
isn’t she, to be the Professor’s daughter. Not the sort I should have
expected at all.”
“Nor I. However---- Well, Barnes, what is it?”
The steward had entered, hastily. “Mr. Wilkins and Miss Shishkin don’t
seem to be aboard, ma’am!” he exclaimed.
“Not aboard? Nonsense! They must be!”
“I’ve hunted everywhere, ma’am. I’ve looked in Miss Shishkin’s cabin,
ma’am, and she ain’t there. There weren’t nothing there but a red light
burning in the port-hole, ma’am.”
Caruth sprang to his feet, tearing the telephone-receiver from his
head. “A red light? Man, you’re crazy!”
“No, sir; I ain’t, sir. There was a lantern wrapped round with a red
cloth burning in her port-hole. And she’s gone, sir. She ain’t on
board, sir; and Mr. Wilkins ain’t on board either.”
For an instant Marie and Caruth stared at the man in dumb silence. Then
the girl realized the situation. “Treachery!” she cried. “Treachery!
Wilkins has betrayed us! I never trusted him. He’s betrayed us, and
he’s carried the girl off.”
“Carried her off? It’s impossible!”
“Impossible or not, it’s been done. Maybe she went with him
willingly--I don’t know and I don’t care. She’s gone, and he’s gone,
and there’s danger in it! Danger! It means we are watched. It means
we’ll be attacked----”
“Attacked?”
“Yes, attacked! Do you think Russia will try to arrest us? She
couldn’t! We are within our rights. We are only seeking salvage. She
won’t dare to arrest us. She’ll send ruffians to attack us and kill or
imprison us all. The _Sea Spume_ will disappear as the _Orkney_ did.
No one will ever hear of it again. Quick! For God’s sake, give me that
telephone! I’ll stay here. Go and find Captain Wilson! Serve out arms.
Prepare to fight; for, as God is my judge, we will have to fight or
perish. Don’t I know Russia and its police? Quick! The murderers may be
creeping on us now.”
In three steps Caruth was on deck, and in three more on the bridge at
Captain Wilson’s side. Eagerly he poured out his story.
“If the police come for us openly, we must yield,” he finished. “But
Miss Fitzhugh says they will not come openly. She says they will come
as pirates, thieves, murderers. If they do, we must fight for our
lives. We’re armed and----”
“We’ll do it! I’ll give orders.” The captain was gone with the words
trailing over his shoulders.
The _Sea Spume_ had been bought and fitted out as a dispatch boat by
the United States Government at the breaking out of the Spanish war.
At its close, she had been sold, guns and all, to the highest bidder;
since then she had changed hands once or twice, but none of her owners
had dismantled her. Finally Caruth, who had served on her during the
war with other boy members of the Naval Militia, had bought her and had
brought her up almost to a man-of-war pitch. When he had started for
Russia, he had needed to add only a little ammunition to put the yacht
in condition to cope with anything of her tonnage.
This armament was now to stand the adventurers in good stead. Caruth,
watching from the bridge, saw the wave of excitement ripple along
the vessel at the captain’s low-spoken commands; saw the tarpaulins
jerked from the guns, revealing the long black muzzles of the six-pound
rapid-firers; heard the splutter of the search-light as the men tested
its connection, and the rattle of the hoists as the fixed ammunition,
cartridge-like in ease of handling, was brought upon the deck.
Suddenly all lights went out, and the _Sea Spume_ became only a darker
spot in the opaque blackness of the night. Simultaneously fell silence,
profound and tomblike!
Ghost-like, Captain Wilson mounted the bridge. “Everything’s ready,”
he reported in scarcely audible tones. “If anybody comes for us now,
they’ll get a warm reception. The men are crazy for a scrap.”
“Good! This means double pay all round, Captain. You might pass the
word. I’m going to the cabin now to find out what news there is from
the divers. Miss Fitzhugh is at the telephone.”
But Caruth was not to go to the telephone then. As his foot poised
above the first step of the companionway, from the bows a shrill
challenge came.
“Boat ahoy! Boat ahoy! What boat is that?”
No answer came. But out in the darkness a voice uplifted itself in
short but swift command, intelligible by its tone if not by its
syllables. Unseen men responded with an eager cheer, followed by a
splash of oars in the water.
“The search-light! Quick!” shouted Captain Wilson, and at the word the
electric sword glimmered through the darkness, illuminating the black
water, and illuminating too, a score of boats, loaded with men, dashing
upon the yacht.
Small time was there for parley. “Aim! Fire!” yelled the captain; and
the flames of the guns split the darkness, while their thunders echoed
back from the cliffs that towered close beside.
“Fire at will!” yelled Wilson, again; and again the guns roared, not
all together as before, but in a pitter-patter of rattling sound.
Swiftly the search-light circled, picking out the boats for an instant
as vivid bull’s-eyes for the concentration of the yacht’s fire; dancing
away again to some fresh point.
The yachtsmen were poor gunners, but at that range they could not
miss. The revolving search-light soon showed an inextricable tangle
of boats, drifting or turning unbalanced athwart the course of their
companions, with oars dropping from dead fingers and men plunging
limply after them into the embrace of the tide. Other boats showed
for an instant in the glare, then sank beneath the shimmering water.
But past and through all these, others kept their way, intent only on
coming to hand-grips with the men of the yacht. In the gaps of sound,
the same ringing voice still sounded, as the unseen commander incited
his men to fresh efforts.
For a moment fate hung in the balance. Then, as Caruth, pistol in
hand, leaped down from the ladder to join in repelling the boarders
who seemed about to swarm over the taffrail, the tide turned. The
Russians, overtaxed, bewildered, hesitated and fled, some by boat, some
by swimming; those who had gained the yacht’s shrouds leaped back in
panic, careless whether planks or the Baltic lay beneath them.
Captain Wilson’s deep voice rang out. “Cease firing!” he shouted.
“Cease firing!”
Silence followed storm. Then out of the night came a flash and a roar.
A jet of ruddy flame shot from the cliff side toward the _Sea Spume_
and the skylight above the saloon vanished in a rain of splinters and
flying glass. The search-light, flung to port, showed, high up on the
cliffs, two heavy guns, armed and manned.
Stupefied, the yachtsmen stared at them, unmoving, till again came a
flash and a report and a rending roar as the yacht quivered to the
impact of a shell.
Captain Wilson woke to life. “Fire on that battery!” he yelled. “Mr.
Caruth, get those divers up. We can’t stay here.”
Blood flecked Caruth’s lip where he had bitten it through. “What!” he
cried. “Run away and leave the gold to them? I won’t do it.”
“You must!”
“I won’t. I’ll----”
A hand fell on the young man’s arm. Marie Fitzhugh stood beside him.
“The gold is gone,” she moaned.
“Gone!”
“Yes! The strong room on the _Orkney_ has been broken open. The boxes
are there, but they are empty. Some one has been before us. The gold is
gone.”
“Impossible.”
“It’s true. I ordered the divers on board. They are coming over the
side now. We must flee. Quick, Captain! Full speed ahead.”
The engine bells clanged, and the yacht shook to the throb of the
screws. Rapidly she gathered way. Another shot from the battery on the
cliff hissed over her, and still another went wide. Then a turn in the
channel shielded her from farther danger.
It was not until half an hour later that it was learned that Professor
Shishkin had disappeared.