“Just let me get up on the prow with a gun!” Alex exclaimed, pulling
himself out of a puddle of water on the deck. “I want to get a couple of
shots at those devils on board that steamer!”
“What did they do to you?” asked Case.
“They didn’t do nothing to me, only choked me nearly to death with the
collar of my own shirt,” said the boy, “but I heard them planning to
leave us lying at the bottom of the lagoon and steal the boat.”
“That’s what they’re here for!” Clay answered. “When you see a whiskey
boat on any river, you may make up your mind that the men on board will
commit murder if they find it necessary.”
“If we don’t get more speed on,” Case exclaimed, pulling Alex away as he
made a dash for the prow, “they’ll beat us to the entrance to the lagoon
now.”
Clay rushed back to the motors to see if another ounce of power could
not be turned on while Jule seized the lines and headed the boat off on
the port side.
“They’ll come in from the river side,” he said to Case, “and we may slip
through between their prow and the little bend which tops the lagoon on
the north side.”
The _Rambler_ was moving much faster than the steamer, but the latter
had several rods the start. As they raced desperately for the narrow
strip of water between the two arms of the island it was an open
question as to which would win.
“I just believe she’s going to get there first!” Jule said drawing still
farther away to port. “Can’t you make her go any faster, Clay?”
“Every pound of power is on!” Clay replied. “You boys would better be
getting your guns ready. If we come together they may try to board us.
If you shoot, shoot to some purpose.”
“We ain’t a-going to come together!” Jule whispered to Alex, who now
occupied a position at his side. “At least, we’re not going to come
together so they can jump over on our deck.”
“What are you going to do?” Alex asked. “Look here!” Jule queried. “The
_Rambler_’s sides and prow are braced with steel, aren’t they?”
“You know it!” Alex answered with a chuckle as he began to understand
the purpose of his chum.
“Well, then,” Jule declared, “I’m going to ram her! If that steamer gets
her nose in our way, I’m going to send the _Rambler_ plumb through her.
I wonder how they’ll like that?”
“If you do,” Alex advised, “reverse the minute you strike. If you don’t,
you are likely to get wedged into any hole you may make.”
“I tell you I’m going to send the _Rambler_ clear through her!” insisted
Jule. “I’m going to bang her with all the force of the motors.”
“Go to it!” Alex exclaimed. “I’m game for any racket of that kind. Only
don’t you say anything to Clay about it. He’d be afraid of breaking the
motors or something.”
The _Rambler_ was now almost to the entrance. The steamer was still
moving upstream. As the boys looked the prow of the whiskey boat turned
almost directly into the path which the motor boat must follow in order
to leave the lagoon.
Jeers of triumph arose from the cabin deck of the steamer as those on
board took in the significance of the situation. They now considered it
certain that the _Rambler_ would soon be at their mercy, blocked beyond
the possibility of escape in the lagoon.
Jule at the helm of the motor boat, however, had a very different idea
as to how the scene ought to terminate. In a second the great steamer,
lumbering and loosely built, lay broadside to the oncoming _Rambler_.
Clay gave a cry of warning as the boy swirled the boat so as to strike
the steamer amidships, but Jule held on to his course.
Before Clay could utter another cry of warning, the steel prow of the
_Rambler_ crashed into the steamer about a third back from the prow!
It seemed for a moment as if Jule’s prediction that he would go clear
through the lumbering old steamer was to be fulfilled, for the steel
prow cut into the thin sides of the steamer as a knife cuts into cheese.
The shock was terrific.
The boys were knocked off their feet, and Jule found himself rolling on
the deck with the tiller ropes still grasped in his hands!
Shouts of rage and alarm came from the sinking boat, and there was an
immediate rush for the railing overlooking the motor boat. The steamer
was still staggering under the impact of the blow, and those on board
were reeling like drunken men.
Clay’s first act was to reverse the motors. Much to his delight and
surprise, the _Rambler_ backed slowly out of the cavity she had cut into
the side of the steamer. The side wall of the ponderous old boat had
been shattered into bits many feet on either side of the actual cut!
As the _Rambler_ backed away, the steamer began drifting downstream,
moving as chance would have it, toward the main channel of the river
instead of toward the lagoon. The boys saw at once that she was filling
with water, and would probably sink where she lay. They saw, too, that
men with pistols in their hands were threatening them from the cabin
deck of the steamer.
With fear and trembling Clay set the motors going again, wondering
whether they had been injured in the collision so as to render the
_Rambler_ unmanageable. The motors responded nobly, however, and in a
moment the boys had the satisfaction of seeing her glide past the
dipping prow of the steamer.
It was dark as ink over the surface of the river, and Alex turned on the
lights as the _Rambler_ rounded the sinking saloon boat and swept on
downstream. Once well under way, Clay walked up to the prow and looked
it over.
“Any harm done?” called Jule.
“No harm that paint and putty won’t repair,” answered Clay. “That is,
not here,” he added. “Some of you boys would better look into the
cabin.”
The cabin certainly was in a mess. Alex’s cherished catfish lay rolling
on the floor, with Teddy shambling back and forth after it. Many of the
lockers had been burst open, and a heap of broken crockery lay on the
floor not far from the electric coils. The glass panel in the cabin door
was shattered, and the coal stove, which had been used in lower
latitudes to keep the boys warm, lay on its side.
“Everything’s all right in here!” Alex cried sticking his freckled nose
through the sash formerly occupied by the glass panel. “Nothing wrong in
here at all, except that the stove is tipped over, and the dishes are
all broken, and our expensive wardrobes are rolling in the dirt, and
Teddy’s eating up my catfish. Oh, we’re all right in here!”
Clay left the prow and looked through into the cabin.
“We ought to charge this to Jule!” he said with a laugh.
“All right!” said Jule. “I wouldn’t have missed that for a thousand
dollars. Do you think I sunk that boat?”
“You certainly did!” answered Clay. “The last I saw of her as we came
around the bend her cabin lights were shining mighty low.”
“And now,” Case complained, “they’ll be sending word on down the river
to have us arrested for piracy on the high seas.”
“Don’t you ever think they will!” Alex put in. “I don’t believe there’s
a man on board that boat that dare step foot either into Indiana or
Kentucky. They sell drugged moonshine whiskey, and they rob every man
that comes on board, so it’s a sure thing that there’s a warrant for
them in every town along the river.”
“I didn’t think you had it in you, Jule!” Clay laughed.
“What’s the answer?” Jule questioned.
“I didn’t think you had the nerve to ram a boat the size of that one. It
was a desperate thing to do.”
“Huh!” grinned Jule. “I guess if I hadn’t rammed her, we’d be packed
like sardines in some dirty old steamer hold now.”
“And that’s no dream!” Alex shouted.
With her prow light burning brightly, the _Rambler_ proceeded slowly
down the river. In a few moments they came to four great coal barges
stranded on a sand bar. As they glided by a man in a rowboat shot out
into the circle of light and called out:
“What’s the trouble up the river, boys?”
“Oh,” Alex answered, “a saloon boat ran into something and broke in two.
I guess she’s sinking.”
“I thought I heard a crash of some kind,” answered the stranger.
“Anybody likely to get drowned?”
“I hope so!” Clay answered. “That’s one of the meanest outlaw boats on
the river. I was glad to see her going down.”
“Indeed it is,” agreed the other. “I saw the men on board of her getting
the bargemen drunk. You see the result here. Hundreds of tons of
perfectly good coal wasted.”
“Suppose we run into a cove here, or up against one of those barges,”
Jule whispered, “and see if this man knows anything about the three blue
lights.”
The _Rambler_ was steered under the lee of the lower barge downstream
from the sand bar and the stranger rowed alongside.
Clay was about to question him regarding the phenomenon, now twice
witnessed, when the hum of low voices came from the shore. The boy
listened intently and the next moment the heavy tramping of horses’ feet
came to his ears. Directly the sharp whinny of a restive horse cut the
still air!