DISAPPOINTMENT
“Oh! my stars!”
That was what George said, in a faint voice, as though he was very
nearly overcome, after taking his look into the box, Jack holding the
same most obligingly all the while.
Of course, even this did not have any effect upon Josh, who was next in
line. In fact, if anything, it served to spur him on to all the sooner
get his peep-in; wondering at the same time what it could be.
Buster heard Josh give a gasp, as he bent his head down. It must be
something wonderfully fetching, to influence all of the boys in that
queer way. And consequently Buster, impatient for his turn, actually put
out his hand and shoved Josh out of the way.
No sooner had he looked than he too gave evidence of being nearly
overcome.
“Great governor! somebody hold me. I’m going to faint!” was what Buster
whispered; and this suspicious remark made Andy want to get out of line,
only that Herb, coming last, would not allow such a thing, but actually
shoved the other up until he just had to do his duty and look.
Andy threw up both hands as he exclaimed, perhaps in a louder voice than
was really discreet:
“Tare and ounds! Be the powers, ’tware a grave afther all, so it was!”
“What’s that?” quivered from the lips of Herb, as he now hesitated in
turn.
“Come on, don’t hang back like that, Herb; you’ve just got to see!”
ventured Josh, laying hold of the other’s sleeve, and commencing to drag
him forward.
It was like the boy who jumps into the pond so early in the spring that
he is nearly frozen stiff; but whoever heard of him confessing to the
fact; while his comrades hesitate on the bank he puts on the most
angelic face possible, and declares that the water is “as warm as
anything;” until he has coaxed them all in; for misery loves company,
they tell us.
So Herb had to do his duty, and look.
“Good gracious, why, it’s only a little puppy dog after all!” broke from
his white lips, as he stood there and stared.
“That’s just what it is,” replied Jack. “And after all, that fellow
spoke what he meant, when we thought he referred to another sort of
treasure. This must have been his pet.”
“But Jack darlint,” broke in Andy, “phat d’ye think he wanted to bury
this ki-yi on the island for at all, at all?”
“What for?” echoed Buster, before Jack could say a word, “why, because
the little beast had gone and kicked the bucket--died on him--you know.”
“Must have been a pet dog,” suggested Josh, “’cause we heard him say he
felt bad at putting the thing underground. Say, Jack, d’ye think now,
the little beast could a got hurt that night when they broke into the
Lawrence bank and looted it? P’raps somebody fired at the thieves and
hit the pup; or it might a got hold of rat poison somehow.”
“Quit your guessing, Josh; what does it matter to us how the poor little
beast came to his end?” demanded George, who had a liking for dogs
himself, and seemed to feel less hilarity than any of the rest, once the
shock of the discovery, and their own disappointment wore away.
Jack was for taking it as a joke at his expense.
“Say, just think of that splendid sneak of mine wasted,” he remarked,
sadly. “And all for this, too. I’ve got half a notion to crawl back
again, and bury the poor little wretch over, just to pay for making such
a mistake.”
“But hold on,” Herb observed, “this doesn’t mean that the two over
yonder ain’t what we took ’em to be, does it? There’s the white boat,
you know, with the red trimming; didn’t Jack tell us he could see it
plain enough anchored close to the shore? Just because they put a little
pet dog underground don’t make ’em better, I reckon, eh, Jack?”
Jack did not reply immediately. The old doubts were commencing to work
double time with him. He was beginning to question the truth of their
solution of the problem. Again he could see the face of the younger
fellow, who had seemed to be hardly more than a boy. Was that affectation
only assumed? Might it not be a part of the nature of the fellow
after all? Was he a desperate crook, who was able to put on an air of
innocence; or could it be possible they had made a tremendous mistake,
and that he was a pampered son of some rich man, cruising in his fine
motorboat, with a mechanic as crew to do the rough work, while he played
his part as skipper of the craft?
Yes, Jack was now in the Doubting Thomas class. He shook his head, and
seemed to be trying to figure things out, as he laid the box on the
ground, and covered it temporarily with the lid which had taken him so
long to pry off.
“And if they are the bank thieves,” Herb went on to say, “what d’ye
suppose they could have done with all that stuff they took away? Think
they buried the same before they got here to this island, Jack, or could
it still be on board the little white boat right now?”
“Oh! yes, that’s the stuff; how about it, Jack?” George went on to add.
“We sure did fall all over ourselves in making this blunder,” admitted
Josh, “and it’s up to us now to get busy and try to make things square.”
“Of course,” said Jack, slowly, as though he might be revolving this
last idea in his mind, “that’s possible. If these are the right men, and
they’ve not got rid of the plunder up to now, why, it stands to reason
it would be somewhere on board, that’s right.”
“But seems to me, Jack,” remarked Herb, suspiciously, “you’re beginning
to hedge a heap. Just a little while ago you were dead sure these
fellows must be the two robbers. Now you say ‘if they are.’ How’s that?
Didn’t you see their boat, and wasn’t it just what that newspaper
account said the suspicious craft looked like.”
“Boys, I admit all that,” the other went on to say, “but if you stop and
think, the article in the paper didn’t say positively that the white
boat belonged to the bold bank thieves--only that it had been seen
hanging around, like it might be in hiding, and they thought it must
have for a crew the two yeggs who broke into the Lawrence bank. There’s
some difference, you’ll admit between making a positive statement, and
just guessing things.”
“Well, for one, I still believe they are the men that are wanted,” said
George, to prove that he had not been convinced otherwise.
“I think so, too,” added Josh.
“And for one now,” added impetuous George, boldly. “I’d like nothing
better than to sneak that boat of theirs away while they sleep. What
d’ye say to that, fellows, ain’t it worth considering?”
For a minute no one replied. The audacity of the proposition staggered
them, it seemed; and yet as is nearly always the case with boys, it
appealed to the love of mischief and the daring that somehow seems to be
a part of their nature.
“Say that would be a great stunt, now,” said Josh.
Buster drew a long breath as he went on to say:
“George, you ain’t so very bad a hand at laying out a game after all.
Whee! just think how they’d rub their eyes, and stare, when they woke up
in the morning, and went to look for the jolly old white boat, which
wouldn’t be there.”
George began to feel his importance. After all, Jack could not have a
monopoly of engineering things; once in a great while some other fellow
was apt to have an inspiration; and it seemed to be his turn just then.
“You seem to think well of my little scheme?” he remarked, proudly.
“Jack, how do you feel about it?” asked cautious Herb, not noticing that
the other had as yet made no comment; which, in some boys might have
signified that they were feeling jealous; but everybody knew Jack
Stormways could not allow such a thought to enter his head.
“Do you want to know my idea, George?” asked Jack, frankly.
“I sure do,” came the reply.
“Well, I’ll tell you,” the other went on to say. “It would be a great
stunt to carry off this white boat, if only we were sure the parties are
the robbers. But stop and think what we’d be up against if they were
innocent parties. Why, they could have us arrested for stealing their
craft; and what excuse would we have to offer? The old gag about not
knowing it was loaded wouldn’t pass in court. We’d get a heavy fine,
even if it wasn’t worse. This is a time when it’ll pay us to be sure
before we go ahead.”
“Huh! p’raps you’re right, Jack,” grunted Josh, already beginning to
weaken before this sort of logic.
George did not open his mouth, but he was always willing to listen to
what Jack had to say; for the other never gloried in showing any of his
comrades up as being in the wrong.
“But the principal thing of all, and which we’d have to find out first,
before thinking of hooking the boat, would be to know whether they
expect to sleep ashore, or aboard,” Jack went on to say.
At that Buster tittered.
“Think what a cheeky thing it’d be,” he remarked, softly, “if we ran
away with the boat, and then found that we’d kidnapped a couple of
innocent ducklings, one of them mamma’s darling boy! Whew! mebbe we
wouldn’t feel cheap though!”
“Oh!” said Jack, “then you’ve been thinking that this terrible Slim
Jim, the dandy hobo, might be somebody else, have you, Buster? Well, I
tell you what we ought to do, boys--hang around, and watch that pair
some more. If they begin to get the camp ready as though they meant to
stay ashore tonight, we can talk it over again, and decide whether we’ll
play George’s trick or not with the boat. How?”
“I say leave it that way,” ventured Josh, now completely won over.
“I’m agreeable,” George hastened to say, for he was not altogether
unreasonable in anything save that troublesome engine aboard his
Wireless; and in that quarter he would never take advice from any one
until in difficulties; he knew it all.
And so it was arranged.
They could creep up, and from their old place of observation keep an eye
on the two who were under suspicion; and in this way something might
arise whereby they would be able to tell definitely whether they would
be justified in going to extremes, or ought to keep their hands off.
Even as they started to once more advance toward the spot where the camp
fire burned, they began to hear a strange clanking sound, as of steel
smiting steel, that gave them new cause for wonder.