SALVAGE
The task which Jack had undertaken was not so formidable as it might
have been, for everything was in his favor. The end of a manila hawser
was cast to him. This he made fast to the quarter-bitts, and then he
headed due east to clear the end of Greenport breakwater. When once she
felt the strain of the hawser holding her back, the little _Sea-Lark_
tugged and fretted like a greyhound puppy at its leash, for she had a
dead weight of several hundred tons dragging at her heels. And for a
few minutes that dead weight almost seemed to be anchored securely to
the bottom of the ocean. But the steady pull of the sloop presently
began to tell. The schooner moved sluggishly, reluctantly, but the main
point was that she moved, and before long the _Sea-Lark_ had enough way
on to make a steady three knots an hour, for the wind could not have
been blowing from a more satisfactory quarter.
Exciting moments came when a particularly strong gust swept down on the
two craft. With her boom swung away out, to catch the full benefit of
the wind, the _Sea-Lark_ strained her slender mast now and again more
than Jack cared to contemplate. There was no “give” to ease her, with
that solid weight dragging astern. Sometimes, also, a following sea hit
the sloop viciously, breaking over her quarter, half drenching the boy
at her wheel, and pouring down into the cockpit. Once, after the sloop
had been struck in this manner, Captain Jordan hailed the _Sea-Lark_
from the deck of the schooner.
Putting his hand to his ear Jack turned to listen.
“I’ll send you a man to give a hand if you like,” the fisherman shouted
down the wind.
Jack could not make his own voice heard in reply, but there was no
mistaking the meaning of the wave of his arm, with which he signaled
back.
“Not if I know it!” he said emphatically to his companion. “What do you
think, Rod?”
“I should say not! Why, we must be almost half-way back now. There
would be no fun in it if we let some one else complete the job.”
“That’s just what I’m worrying about,” observed Jack. “We’re on the
way, all right, and if nobody interrupts us we shall get there safely
enough. But where is that tug? I can’t even hear her squeaking.”
“She must have left Rockmore long ago,” said Rod. “They’d have some
difficulty in locating us while this haze keeps as bad as it is now,
but they’ll find us, sure enough.”
“I wonder what will happen when the tug does bob up,” Jack said. “If it
arrived just now I don’t think I’d have the cheek to refuse to give up
the tow.”
“Why not?” So far as Rod could see they were doing perfectly
satisfactorily.
“Well,” replied Jack with a laugh, “you’ve got to remember that we
aren’t under steam-power, and they are, for one thing. Also, the tug is
Barker’s boat, and perhaps――”
“Rubbish!” declared Rod. “If you take my advice you’ll hang on as
long as the sloop holds together and as long as you’re doing what you
contracted to do. Didn’t the captain say he was glad to have you give
him a tow? And didn’t he agree that if you began to tow you could
finish it?”
“Well, we’ll see,” replied Jack. “I’ve got no complaints at present.
Never heard of such luck!”
“Five hundred dollars seems an awful lot of money for doing a little
bit of a thing like this, though, doesn’t it?” asked Rodney.
“Yes, it sounds a lot to us, but you must remember that the _Grace and
Ella_ is worth thousands of dollars and has a full catch of ground-fish
under her hatches. It isn’t exactly the idea of losing the salvage
money that makes me hope the tug will miss us somehow, though,” he
added with a grim smile.
“It’s quite enough reason,” observed Rod.
“Yes, but I want to keep this tow till we get right into the harbor,”
said Jack. “I can’t very well be in two places at the same time, but
I’d give a month’s earnings at the ferry to be standing near Mr. Simon
Barker and watch his face when he sees this schooner of his being towed
in by the _Sea-Lark_. It won’t take him more than about a minute to
realize that I’m getting a very nice revenge for something he said to
me only a couple of days ago. Slip up for’ard there, Rod, will you?
I believe I spotted the Point then, and I want to make sure of my
bearings. The haze seems to be clearing off a bit――”
Then something happened which he had been dreading. Across the water,
from the direction of Four Fathom bell-buoy, which the _Sea-Lark_ had
now left full three miles astern, came the sharp, piping call of the
tug.
Four short squeaks, a long one, and finally a short one.
“No mistaking _her_,” was Rod’s only comment. Much to Jack’s delight,
the captain of the _Grace and Ella_ did not attempt to signal back.
Such a proceeding would, however, have been difficult anyway, against
the wind.
“There’s the Point!” suddenly cried Rod from the bow and a minute
later Jack altered his course a shade, for the weather was clearing up
rapidly and he saw it was necessary to make a little more southing. At
the same time he glanced back over his shoulder. The squawk of the tug
was now insistent.
“I believe we shall manage it yet,” he said delightedly. “Another
twenty minutes or so will take us round the end of the breakwater, and
the tug hasn’t spotted us yet.”
But, as he spoke, the rain ceased, and presently the ocean was visible
for miles.
“Here she comes!” Jack cried as his eyes fell on the distant shape of
the fussy little _Simon P. Barker_. “Tearing along like a snail! And I
guess her skipper’s roaring mad now that he can see what happened.”
“Keep going! Keep going!” urged Rod, almost dancing with delight.
“You bet I’m going to keep going!” replied Jack, with the light of
battle in his eyes. “He’d bust his boilers in catching up with us now,
before we’re round the breakwater. Did you ever hear Steve Burke talk
when he’s real mad, Rod?”
“I don’t remember ever even seeing him.”
“Well, you will in a while, and it’s no Quaker meeting he’s coming to,
either! He knows what to expect from Mr. Barker as soon as he lands
ashore, for missing the schooner. Rod, I’m not going to let go now.
Burke wouldn’t dare to run us down. Of course if Captain Jordan cuts us
adrift, that settles it; but my guess is that he won’t.”
“It’s a pretty race, isn’t it!” said Jack, a moment later. “Two
tortoises, and one of them hobbled! Thank goodness Burke daren’t drive
his old tug any faster, or her rotten engines would shake themselves to
pieces.”
Meanwhile the irate skipper of the tug was protesting loudly with his
squeaky siren. The _Simon P. Barker_ wallowed and rolled nearer and
nearer, but the _Sea-Lark_ was fast approaching the safe refuge of the
harbor. Soon the tug was only about a thousand yards astern, but by
then Jack was negotiating the end of the breakwater, and there only
remained the straight run up the harbor to the wharf. The tug, however,
evidently had no intention of relinquishing her claim, for she fussed
up to the heels of the sloop and hailed.
“Let go that hawser!” Burke shouted angrily to Jack.
“Can’t do it. I’m under contract,” replied Jack, steadily.
“Well, I’ll bust your contract, and you too, if you don’t hand me that
hawser mighty quick,” Burke snapped back. His practised hand was at the
wheel, and the tug was now gliding through the water within a few feet
of the _Sea-Lark’s_ side. Jack, however, did not give way an inch. He
was by no means sure that Burke would not bump into him and secure the
tow by main force. But the tug’s skipper knew just a little too much
of sea law to carry his tactics as far as that. At this stage Captain
Jordan put in a word.
“Let the lad alone,” he shouted. “He came first, and I had to give him
the job.”
“And what’s your owner going to say to you?” Burke yelled back to the
captain of the schooner.
“He can say what he likes,” returned Captain Jordan. “I’ve got a word
or two to put into his ear for sending me to sea with rotten spars, and
I’ve a right to arrange for a tow whenever I think it prudent. Now beat
it, or you’ll be having a smash-up yet, and then there’ll be _real_
money to pay out.”
With no alternative, Burke sidled away from the two vessels, muttering
savagely, but realizing that he could put in no just claim to complete
the tow. By that time Gull Island had been reached, and Jack could make
out figures on the wharves ahead.
“Jordan is a brick for standing up for you like that,” Rod said.
“I thought he would,” replied Jack. “But, you know, a bargain is a
bargain, and we had the law on our side, after all.”
“Our friend Burke looked as though he would like to bite your head off.”
“He wasn’t very polite about it, was he? But you just wait a few
minutes till we draw up alongside Barker’s wharf. That’s when the fun
will begin.”
They plodded slowly on until Captain Jordan hailed them from the
schooner.
“Stand by to cast that hawser off,” he directed.
“Aye, aye!” replied Jack. “Rod, lay hold of that line, and be ready to
slack away.”
“Let go!” shouted Captain Jordan at last.
The hawser fell with a splash into the water, and Jack brought the
sloop round into the wind, leaving the _Grace and Ella_ with enough way
on to sidle to her berth.
An angry face appeared at the edge of the wharf.
“What d’ye mean by meddling in my affairs?” demanded Mr. Barker,
scowling down on the boys.
“Meddling?” said Jack unruffled. “I was giving her a little tow.
Doesn’t she look as though she needed it? It was quite a salvage job.”
“Salvage!” Mr. Barker’s surprise and consternation were ludicrous. “You
get no salvage out o’ me, young man! No one asked you to interfere.
What do you suppose I sent my tug out for?”
“Tug didn’t come in time,” put in Captain Jordan. “I had to engage the
sloop to make sure.”
“You engaged her?” queried Barker in horrified tones.
“What else could I do?” retorted Captain Jordan. “The tide would have
turned in another twenty minutes. Maybe you wouldn’t have minded the
schooner being piled up on the sand, but I minded.”
“Then you’ll pay for it,” snarled Barker. “I won’t. No, sir! Not a red
cent! What did you arrange to pay this――this kid?”
“Five hundred dollars, and――”
“Five hundred!” echoed Mr. Barker in agony.
“Why not? He saved you perhaps ten times that much.” Captain Jordan was
becoming annoyed at having to bandy words of this order from ship to
wharf.
Simon Barker leaned over and wagged his finger in the direction of the
captain of the _Sea-Lark_.
“Don’t you think for one minute,” he spluttered, “that I’ll ever pay
it.”
“We’ll see,” replied Jack, quietly.
There were few patrons for the ferry that day, and after landing Rodney
on the Point Jack returned to town and hurried home to his dinner. He
reached the house before his father was through and quickly told his
story. Mr. Holden was neither hopeful nor helpful.
“Don’t have anything to do with the man,” he begged. “He’ll find some
loophole of escape, and goodness knows there has been unpleasantness
enough already.”
“But, Dad, I _earned_ it!” the boy protested. “Captain Jordan knows
what he is talking about. I’m going to consult a lawyer. Mr. Merrill
will see the thing is settled fairly. What’s the use of letting an old
skinflint like Barker cheat me out of the money?”
Mr. Holden made a vague motion with his hands.
“If you consult Mr. Merrill you’ll have to pay him, remember,” he
said. “Lawyers only cost you money in the end.”
“Maybe,” said Jack, “but you know quite well I should never be able to
get that salvage money without a lawyer’s help. I want your permission
to put the case in his hands, Dad.”
“All right,” said Mr. Holden reluctantly.
Five minutes later Jack was explaining to the jovial little lawyer all
that had happened.
“Well, Mr. Barker hates to part with his cash,” said the man of law.
“But I’ll see him in a day or two when he has calmed down, and perhaps
he will be in a more reasonable frame of mind then.”
Mr. Merrill had the reputation of being able to pour oil on troubled
waters more effectively than any other attorney in the county, but for
once his skill in such matters proved ineffective. Simon Barker was as
obstinate as a mule. He declared he would be sold up and even go to
prison rather than pay five hundred dollars to Jack Holden.
“But,” said the lawyer, reporting the outcome of his interview to Jack
two days later, “he will pay in the end. He can’t help paying. He can
fight, and stand us off for a long time if he wants to, but sooner or
later, Jack, he’s got to come to terms. So sit tight, my boy, and let
Simon and me do the worrying.”