WIGWAGS FROM THE BEACH.
For a long time after the departure of Ned, Jack and Frank sat in the
cabin of the _Manhattan_, looking out on the steady downpour. They were
not quite satisfied with their share in the activities of the day.
Instead of being housed in the cabin, they preferred an exciting hunt
even in the rain, over the hills of the little island in view.
"If we stand for it," grumbled Jack, "we'll have to spend most of our
time keeping house! Jimmie will scatter himself all over the Asiatic
division of the map, and Ned will spend most of his time looking him
up!"
Frank laughed at this outbreak of ill humor, although he was as anxious
as his chum to be on the firing line.
"I wish we'd not taken the _Manhattan_," Jack continued. "I'm the only
one in the party that can operate it, and I'll be tied down like a
galley slave!"
"Go it!" laughed Frank. "Growl your head off, if you want to, Mr. Black
Bear! Instead of snarling, why don't you tell me what makes the boat go
when you do something to the wheel and that switch?"
"I thought you owned a launch?" said Jack.
"Father bought me one," was the reply, "but I've never learned how to
run it. I'm too fat to bother my head about such things!"
"Then what are you asking me about the mechanism of the thing for?"
asked Jack. "If you don't want to know, what's the use of my telling you
how to run a motor boat? You make me weary!"
"If I had a nice little temper like yours," Frank grinned, "I'd go and
bump my head against a tree! Come, old man, tell me about the boat. I
may want to run it some time, after you get caught by a cat or filled
full of poisoned arrows! Come! honest! What makes it go?"
"And you don't even know the action of a gasoline engine?" exclaimed
Jack, in better humor. "Well, I'll tell you. A jet of gasoline, which is
thinner than water, is sprayed, as one would spray any liquid from an
atomizer, into the chamber of the engine cylinder-head, which it reaches
in the form of vapor, having been mixed with air."
"That's all simple!"
"Here the vapor is compressed by the rising piston, and when it is
squeezed up as close as it can be an electric spark is introduced into
the chamber. That is what the electric battery and gear are for."
"I was wondering why one had to have electricity and gasoline both,"
said Frank, very much interested in the simple recital.
"The result of the introduction of the spark is the explosion of the
compressed vapor, which sends the piston downward. The motion turns the
shaft, and that turns the boat's propeller."
"Easy as pie."
"This operation is repeated from two to six hundred times a minute,"
Jack went on, "and that causes the continuous action of the machinery
which sends the boat along."
"What is there about that so complicated?" demanded Frank. "Everybody
you hear talking of an engine seems to speak as if it were one of the
mysteries of the universe."
"It is usually the electric system which gets out of order," was the
reply, "but sometimes the gasoline section balks. A man often has to try
so many different things when his engine stops that he actually does not
know which one remedies the evil and sets the thing in motion."
"All right!" Frank said. "Now show me how to start the thing."
"That's easy. First turn on your gasoline, as you would turn water from
a faucet into a kitchen sink. The gasoline fills the carbureter, which
is the thing which feeds the engine automatically. Then you turn on your
electricity by shifting a switch. That is to supply the spark. Then turn
the fly-wheel two or three times so as to get the vapor into the
cylinder and secure the first explosion. That is all there is to it. I
hope you do learn to run this boat, so I can get away now and then!"
"You may get away farther than you want to!" cautioned Frank.
The _Manhattan_ was a plain, usable boat, twenty-five feet long and ten
feet wide, with bow and stern rather square in order to make more room
inside. The cabin was ten feet long, with strong oak sides and
brass-rimmed ports for light and ventilation. The cockpit, or outdoor
sitting room, was of the same length as the cabin.
The engine was a plain, solidly built machine, with two cylinders, and
rated at ten horsepower, with a speed of fifteen miles an hour. It was
installed under a short bridge-deck in front of the cabin, while the
gasoline tanks, holding fifty gallons, were hidden under the cockpit
seats.
The cabin had two wide slatted berths, supplied with hair mattresses, a
movable table, an ice chest, a small coal range--the boat was not
designed especially for tropical use--an ice-chest and an alcohol stove
for cooking. The storage lockers and water tanks had a capacity of a
week's supply of stores for four persons. It was a government boat, and
was in good repute as a racer in and about Manila, in spite of its blunt
bow and wide beam.
Frank pottered away at the machinery until he announced that it was like
taking candy away from the children to run it, and then the two retired
to the cabin to get rid of their wet garments.
"Ned and Jimmie are having a good soaking," Jack said, his ill humor all
gone, as he soused his wet underclothing in a tub of sea water. "I wish
they'd come home."
A dull thump, as of a canoe striking the motor boat, and a quick step on
the prow caused both boys to spring to their feet.
"There they come now!" Jack cried, glancing out into the slanting rain,
"and it's good and wet they are."
The boy was about to step forward and open the cabin door when Frank
caught him by the shoulder.
"Wait!" he said. "Look there!"
Jack followed the pointing finger with his eyes and saw half a dozen
Filipinos clambering into the cockpit, and also saw the muzzles of
American-built rifles covering the cabin door.
"Get your gun!" Jack whispered.
"We've got to do something besides shoot," Frank said. "They have the
drop on us. We should have been looking out for an attempt at surprise."
There was a moment's silence, and then a man enveloped from neck to
heels in a heavy raincoat and sweating tremendously in consequence,
advanced to the cabin door.
"Never mind the guns!" he said, through the glass. "My men have you
covered, and it would be a pity to shoot two likely boys!"
"What do you want?" demanded Frank.
"We want this boat," was the reply.
"Well, you've got it!" Jack said, angrily.
"Of course we have," was the reply. "We seem to be getting about
everything we want in this corner of the world! Where are the others?"
"Gone after a battleship!" declared Jack.
The man grinned and, opening the cabin door, stepped inside. He was
tall, rather slender, with clean-cut features and bright gray eyes. His
bearing was that of a gentleman, and Frank began to have an indefinable
idea that he had met him before somewhere, just where he could not
decide. The fellow evidently was an American, though his followers
seemed to be Chinese and Filipinos.
"So he's gone after a battleship, has he?" the intruder said, shutting
the cabin door behind him, after making sure that his men were standing
at attention with their guns. "Do they pick battleships off trees up on
the hill?"
"I don't see anything funny about it," Jack said, sourly. "Who do you
mean by 'he'? What do you know about the crew of the boat?"
"I've heard of Mr. Ned Nestor," was the calm reply, "and was hoping to
meet him here. However, you seem to be cheerful young fellows, and a
cruise with you may not result in lost time. You are Jack Bosworth and
Frank Shaw. Which one is Shaw, and which one is Bosworth?"
"I'm Shaw," answered Frank, somewhat amused at the cool impudence of the
man. "What is your name?"
"I'm French," was the reply. "Not French tribally but just French. One
of the sort of Frenchmen who are born of Irish parents in the city of
Chicago! Anyway, you may call me French. That is near enough."
"You seem to be an amusing sort of a character," observed Frank. "What
are you going to do with the _Manhattan_?"
"Why," was the smiling reply, "there is a sort of a political convention
called for that hill over there, and some of the delegates are slow in
coming. So I thought I'd borrow your boat and go and fetch them. They
are not far away. Some of them, in fact, live on islands, not more than
four or five hundred miles off."
"That will be nice!" Frank said, falling into the mood of the other.
"Only you can't carry many native chiefs in this boat, not if they
insist on bringing their wives and attendants along. Suppose one should
insist on appearing before the convention riding in state on the back of
a white elephant?"
"Never thought of that," replied the other with a grin, "but how did you
learn that the delegates were to be native chiefs?"
"I guess most everybody knows what kind of a game you're playing," Frank
said with a grin which he intended to be provoking. "When you get your
delegates assembled, Uncle Sam will give you an imitation of a man
shooting up traitors."
"We'll have to take our chances on that," replied French, with apparent
good nature. "In the meantime, we'll have to ask you to vacate the boat
while we make our collection of delegates. I presume that you can get
along very well on shore. Only be careful that the little brown men
don't pot you with their funny little guns."
"Oh, we'll get along with the little brown men, all right," growled
Jack. "When are you going to put us ashore?"
"Well," was the cool reply, "I want to wait here until I form the
acquaintance of Mr. Ned Nestor and Mr. James McGraw. I have long felt a
desire to meet them!"
"They'll feel proud, I know!" Jack said, provokingly. "Pirates and
traitors are not so thick that it is not a pleasure to meet them. We'll
all remember, after you are all hanged, that we met you here."
"Thank you!" replied French, not at all indignant at the remark, "and
now if you'll hand over the guns you have, and tell me where the others
are hidden, you can walk about the boat in comparative freedom while we
get supper. You see it is beginning to get dark, and I'm hungry."
There was nothing to do but to comply with the polite request, and soon
the intruders were making themselves at home all over the boat. French
brought one of the Filipinos into the cabin, where he sat with his gun
pointing ominously at the boys whenever they moved toward the door,
while the others were stationed on the prow, where they sat stolidly in
the rain, with their guns under their coarse coats to keep them dry.
"Rather a scanty supply of provisions!" French said, as he investigated
the lockers. "I really think I'll have to send one of my men ashore for
dinner. Two men with perfectly good guns and eyesight ought to be able
to keep us on friendly terms here. Besides, it seems a waste of good
material to feed those fellows from this choice stock when they prefer
boiled dog."
"Say, French," Jack said, "if you weren't crooked enough to make a
corkscrew look like a straight-edge, you'd be a pretty good sort of a
chap to go on a cruise with."
"Oh, I'm all right when I'm not abused," French replied. "If Dad had
presented me with a million instead of a thirst for other people's
property, I'd have had my name in the society columns every day! Isn't
it about time for Ned and Jimmie to come home?" he added. "If you don't
mind, I'll run the boat out a little farther, so they'll have to call
and signal when they do come."
"They should have been here long ago," was the reply.
"I must insist that you remain perfectly quiet when they do come,"
French said, after the boat had changed position, in a moment. "I don't
want to spoil this pretty boat with dark stains. Perhaps, however, they
have been captured."
"You would know if they had, wouldn't you?" asked Jack.
"Why, no, I think not. You see I have just arrived, coming in the second
launch, now over there in the bay. I did not go to the camp, but edged
around the hill with half a dozen men in order to see if all was safe.
We've got some pretty high-up men in this game with us, and I'm afraid
Wall street would stand up on its hind legs and howl if their names were
known. Hence this caution."
French seemed to be a college educated man and a gentleman by instinct.
While they were preparing supper he amused them with stories of his
travels and adventures, and both boys heartily wished he was with them
as a friend instead of an enemy. When it grew dark he sent all the
Filipinos away but two, and they sat down to a good meal.
Frank questioned French, cautiously of course, but could gain little
information from him. The fellow seemed fully aware of the purpose of
the boy, and replied to his questions with the most extravagant stories
of the empire that was to be raised in the Philippines after the United
States protectorate had ceased.
"You're a queer chap," Frank said, at the conclusion of one of French's
stories of the grandeur of the coming empire, "and I'd like to hear you
spin yarns all night, but, if you don't mind, I'll go to bed."
"Just as you like," was the amiable reply. "I'll sit here and smoke a
few more cigarettes and then follow your example. It is such a wild
night that your friends may have stopped at a down-town hotel!"
"Perhaps they've stepped over to the Waldorf!" Jack replied.
The lads occupied the same bunk, and talked in whispers all through the
night. They had no idea what had become of Ned and Jimmie except the
supposition that they had been captured by their enemies. French retired
about midnight, as calmly as if he were in his own rooms, leaving the
two Filipinos on guard in the cabin.
Once Frank arose and tried to slip out, his idea being to reach the
shore and look for his chums, but the brown men lifted their guns
automatically as he looked out on them. All through the night they sat
unblinkingly, looking out in the dim light much as glass eyes might have
looked out of the head of a wooden image.
"We're sure in a bad box," Jack whispered, after this attempt at escape.
"I don't believe they'll turn us loose on the island, knowing what we
know. They won't take any chance of our getting away! If Ned was free,
he'd have been here before this, so we may as well make up our minds
that he's in trouble also."
With daylight came a cessation of the storm, and soon the sun was
shining smotheringly down on the little bay. Sweltering in the cabin,
Frank looked out of a port and saw a pole lifted above a clump of low
bushes just back from the distant beach. As he looked the pole moved
forward and back, then to the right, ducking three times and coming back
to a vertical position. The pole wavered to right and left and to the
front for a time, and the boy waved his hand from the open port.
"Wigwag!" he whispered. "It says: 'Brace up!' That's Jimmie!"