IN HONOR BOUND.
"Thank you for the compliment," Jack said; "but there are just six of
us, all told; and each one is as much entitled to your praise as I am."
"I object," George broke in. "Lots of times the pack of us would have
been in a bally lot of hot water only for the clever way you had of
handling things."
"And that's no lie, either!" burst out Jimmy. "Whin there's any credit
flyin' around loose, sure Jack desarves the lion's share, so he does
now."
"Better and better!" cried the man who had given his name as Bliss.
"Why, you're as loyal a bunch of chums as I ever ran across. It's a
rare treat for my friend Carpenter here and myself to meet up with such
fellows, eh, Bryce?"
The way he laid particular emphasis on that name every time he used it
somehow gave Jack the impression that he did not wish the other to
forget who he was! It was of course a queer feeling to have, but the boy
could not get it out of his head.
"How about going back with us, Josh; feel equal to a little walk; or
shall I come around after you in a small boat?" Jack asked.
"Rats! what d'ye take me for?" demanded Josh, indignantly. "Just because
I've got a little puncture in my noggin is no sign I'm out of the
running. Why, course I'll go back with you, and right away, too."
"What's the hurry, boys?" asked Mr. Bliss, quickly.
"Well, for one thing," Jack remarked, "we've got a couple of anxious
chums in camp, who'll be eating their heads off with curiosity to know
what's become of Josh."
"That's right," declared the tall lad, chuckling; "and it's a shame to
keep poor old Nick away from his feed so long. Ten to one he's as hungry
as a bear right now, waiting for grub time to come around."
"But won't you stay and have a bite with us?" asked Mr. Carpenter.
"We're not extra fine cooks, but we've got lots of good stuff aboard."
"That's right kind of you," George thought he ought to say; "but,
considering the circumstances, I reckon we'd better be going, if Josh
says he's fit."
"Well, I'll show you I'm feeling just like myself, and not a bit weak,
after bleeding like a stuck pig," and the long-legged boy started to
climb out of the cabin as he spoke.
"Please wait a minute," Mr. Bliss interrupted. "If you must go, there's
no need of Josh getting himself all wet. You see, we've got it fixed so
we can push ashore by a very little effort on our part, right alongside
the roots of that tree; and where the water chances to be fairly deep.
We had the boat in there when we brought your friend along, and it'll be
easy to get back again. Then a jump lands you, safe and sound."
He snatched up a setting pole, the most useful thing that can be carried
on a cruise along the shallow waters of the keys, and with very little
effort managed to send the anchored boat into the tiny cove, his
companion having loosened the anchor cable meanwhile.
Jack was the first to spring ashore, and the others followed quickly at
his heels, with Josh bringing up the rear, and anxious to prove his
words true about being in first rate condition.
"Glad to have made your acquaintance, boys," said Mr. Bliss; "and if we
happen to cross each others' path again, there's no reason why we
shouldn't be friends, is there?"
"Well, I should say our chum here is under heavy obligations to you,
sir; and on his account, if no other, we'd feel inclined that way,"
returned Jack.
"Shake hands on that, Jack," Mr. Bliss remarked; and each of the four
boys in turn did so, even carrying the friendly act out with the other
skipper of the little power boat.
"The best of luck go with you all!" called out Mr. Bliss, waving his
hand after them.
"Same to you, sir!" replied George, who had apparently quite gotten over
the suspicions by which he had been almost overpowered earlier in the
evening.
And presently, after they had pushed their way across the tongue of land
lying between the two lagoons, they could only tell where the boat which
they had just left lay, by the glowing light flooding out of her cabin.
Jack placed himself at one side of Josh, while George lined up on the
other. But the lanky boy observed these movements with suspicion.
"Hey, what's this mean?" he demanded. "Got an idea I'm apt to keel over
any old minute, have you? Just because I did that silly thing once, now
don't you think she's goin' to get to be a habit with me. That's a
mistake, fellers. I'm tougher'n you reckon on, now. Come along, buck up,
George, and hit up a faster pace."
"Hold on, now," said George, as he struggled with a vine that had caught
him under the chin, and almost lifted him off his feet; "there ain't any
such hurry as all that, you know. It's bad walking here, and I don't
feel like being strangled just yet awhile."
"Yes, pull in your horses, Josh," Jack remarked. "We'll believe you're
all right without you being in such a rush about getting back to camp."
Three minutes later Jack spoke again.
"None of you noticed that either of those gentlemen came ashore after we
left, did you?" he asked, quietly.
"Why, no, of course they didn't," George remarked.
"For what are you askin' that same question?" demanded Jimmy.
"P'raps I might give a guess," remarked Josh, quietly.
"Well, I only wanted to make sure that anything we might say to each
other wasn't likely to get to their ears," Jack went on.
"Say, now you've gone and got me guessing good and hard again,"
remonstrated George. "You seem to just love to say things that sound so
mysterious. Tell a fellow, Jack, there's a good chap, why you don't want
them to hear us talking. Why, we hadn't ought to have anything but good
words to say about those gentlemen after the fine way they acted toward
our chum here."
"That's true enough, George," Jack went on to say; "and make up your
mind I'm the last one to look a gift horse in the mouth to find out his
age; but there were a few things about our two new friends that somehow
made me sit up and take notice; and I wanted to ask Josh here what he
thought."
"I just expected you'd be up to that dodge," the party in question
observed, with a little chuckle, as of amusement. "I knew that if
anybody could get on to their curves, Jack would."
"Curves!" repeated George, wonderingly.
"Sure, he do be thinkin' he's playing baseball again," laughed Jimmy.
"And from the way you talk, Josh," Jack went on, paying no attention to
these side remarks on the part of his other chums, "I can give a guess
that you must have made some little discovery on your own hook that has
told you our two friends might be playing a little game of blindman's
buff with us right now. How is that, Josh?"
"Jack, you're the greatest feller I ever struck, to get on to anything,"
replied the long-legged one, admiringly.
"That isn't answering my question," the other continued.
"Then I'll say, yes," Josh went on.
"Tell us what it was you heard," George asked, once more fairly
boiling with a desire to know everything connected with the mysterious
passengers of the little power boat that had acted so strangely on the
trip down the east coast.
"Hold on a minute," said Josh. "This bandage is slipping down, so I'll
have to get you to fix it for me, boys. Hope the hole's leaked all it's
going to, because I can't afford to lose as much fluid as some fellers,
Nick for instance. There, that feels all right. Now, what was you saying
to me? Oh! yes, about how I happened to get onto the fact that the two
gentlemen that took me aboard their boat might be somethin' else besides
what they said. Was that it?"
"Just what it was!" George came back, knowing how Josh always liked to
beat about the bush more or less before telling anything he knew.
"Well, here's the way it stands, fellers," went on Josh. "You see, after
they carried me on board the boat, I laid there like a mummy in a
trance. But by slow degrees I began to come back again. And all the
while my eyes must have been shut, I could hear some mumbling voices,
though for the life of me I couldn't make out who it was talkin'."
"Oh! hurry up, old ice-wagon; get a move on you, and tell us!" exclaimed
George, almost biting his tongue with impatience.
"I heard one man that I afterwards knew was Mr. Bliss say, as plain as
anything: 'I tell you, they're nothin' but boys, and they ain't goin' to
give us away.' And then the other one, he says, says he: 'If I thought
this one knew anything, I'd be tempted to let him lie there where we
picked him up, that's what. We can't afford to take any chances, and you
know it, Sam!'"
Jack gave a low whistle.
"And yet Mr. Bliss said his friend's name was Bryce Carpenter," he
observed. "I had an idea all along, from the way he called that name, he
wasn't used to saying it. Sam came easier to his tongue. Now, we don't
know who Sam is, or what he's done, but seems to me there's something
crooked about that yarn they set up, of a wager made with that Lenox
fellow."
"They never made such a wager," declared Josh, stubbornly; "and right
now the only thing they want to do is to get around to Tampa, where they
expect to slip aboard a boat bound for Cuba. I heard some more talk
before I opened my eyes and spoiled it all. If the one who calls himself
Carpenter hadn't got cold feet, their plan was to drop down the keys to
Key West, and get across to Havana from there."
"Well, what's that to us?" remarked Jack. "They treated you white, Josh,
didn't they?"
"They sure did," answered the other, warmly.
"All right," Jack went on; "then it's no business of ours who and what
they are; and we'll just have to forget them. But, listen, wasn't that a
shout ahead, there?"