GREAT RISKS
Once back in his own quarters, Bobby tried to quiet his racing thoughts
and think out some plan of action. If only he might talk to Fred and the
other boys!
Then he thought of that night and their secret rendezvous and his heart
leaped with joy.
“Say, make believe I won’t have something to tell them! They’ll probably
think I have been dreaming or am crazy,” he thought excitedly.
He had to caution himself again not to let his imagination run away with
him. He had to be careful also not to let his excitement be seen by his
mates. It seemed to him that they were already regarding him
suspiciously.
He must be cool and calm if he and his chums were to stand any real
chance of escape. “Steal a longboat,” Takyak had ordered. All very well,
but how was such a thing to be done without being discovered?
“Provision it,” Takyak had said again. All very well, but how were they
going to provision it without any provisions?
Well, that was his problem and his chums’, and they must find a way to
solve it. And the solution must come very quickly, within the next
twenty-four hours. At eleven o’clock on the next evening, Takyak had
said.
What was the name of the place he had said they would be near? Baffin
Land! He had heard of it, and he knew enough about its location to know
that they were no longer approaching the Frozen North, but that they
were actually in it.
Suppose Takyak’s information had been wrong? Suppose they should not
pass close to Baffin Land on the following evening? Suppose—always
supposing that they had been able to procure the longboat and provision
it—suppose upon casting themselves adrift on the ocean they were to find
that, after all, they were too far from land to reach it before being
overtaken by any one of the terrible dangers that menaced them there in
that unknown land?
Suppose—but with an impatient movement Bobby shook off the unwelcome
thoughts that crowded his mind. If they were to embark on the adventure
at all he must put all such doubts behind him.
There would be danger, of course, plenty of it, but not much more than
if they remained here on this ship under the ugly eye of a suspicious
captain.
Some way or other Bobby managed to get through the hours that had to
pass before he could hope to meet his chums. When the time came at last
he hurried, as fast as caution would permit, to the rendezvous.
He found two figures there before him. Fred and Mouser had evidently
been more impatient than he.
When he saw Bobby, Fred opened his mouth to shout a greeting, but
thought better of it just in the nick of time.
“I’ll spill the beans yet,” he said, in a sheepish whisper, and at that
moment another silent figure approached them through the shadows.
It was Billy, excited and eager, and their number was complete.
“Now let’s get down to business, Bobby, and tell these fellows why we
called a meeting,” suggested Fred.
“You’d better not talk so loud or we’ll be telling our story to Captain
Garrish,” cautioned Bobby, and the boys glanced about them uneasily.
“I passed somebody on my way up here,” said Billy, in a whisper that
could barely be heard.
“I don’t know who it was, but I had a notion that he followed me for
some little way.”
“Then we haven’t any time to lose,” cried Bobby, and for the first time
the boys noticed the suppressed excitement in his voice.
They crowded close to him, trying to see his face in the deep shadows of
the northern night. There were plenty of questions they wanted to ask,
but Bobby would give them no chance.
Rapidly, he told them what had happened in Chief Takyak’s cabin that
afternoon, and they listened, open-mouthed, with wonder, hardly able to
believe what he was telling them.
Then, when they really gathered what it meant, they wanted to toss their
cape aloft and give vent to their glee.
It was Bobby who restrained their enthusiasm. “No use getting excited
yet,” he said. “We haven’t escaped from this old vessel yet, you know.”
“We’ll have to now,” said Mouser, suddenly sobered. “It’s up to us to
give old Garrish the slip to-morrow night.”
“It won’t be so hard to get the boat,” Fred observed. “We ought to be
able to do that. But it’s getting the provisions that worries me. We’ve
got to have food!”
“Tell us something we don’t know,” grumbled Mouser. “It’s easy to say
we’ve got to get it—”
“And we will get it too,” Bobby interrupted decidedly. “I tell you,
fellows,” he added excitedly, “what would be the matter with our getting
busy now?”
“Great, if you’ll tell us what to do,” agreed Billy.
“Speedy action suits me down to the ground,” added Mouser, eagerly.
“When do we start, Bobby?”
“Right now,” answered Bobby, his words tumbling over one another in his
excitement. “See?” he added, lowering his voice still more and pointing
over his shoulder toward the stern of the ship. “We’ll take that
longboat over there when the time comes. Our job to-night will be to see
that she’s provisioned. We’ll take enough food on board to last us a
week if we need it.”
“Provision her,” Fred echoed excitedly. “I get you, Bobby. We can break
into the hold and get what we need from those boxes—”
“But wait a minute,” Mouser broke in quickly. “If we provision the
longboat now, what’s to prevent the food being discovered to-morrow?”
“I’ve thought of that,” said Bobby shortly. He was impatient of every
moment’s delay. “But we’ll have to take our chance. We can stow most of
the stuff away where it won’t be seen and we can cover the rest with the
old tarpaulin I saw in the boat when I passed it to-day. What say? Are
you coming or do you want to stand there all night arguing?”
Their answer was to follow Bobby’s lead as he crept silently along the
deck to a hatchway they knew they could open.
It was a risky business, taking provisions from the hold at night, and
the boys fully realized the risk they were running. But excitement made
them forget danger.
They were in the midst of the adventure now and their blood answered to
the thrill of it.
They worked swiftly, talking little. Not for nothing had they been kept
prisoners in that hold, forced to live for days out of food taken from
the boxes.
For the first time since they had been thrown into the place the boys
began to be thankful for their experience. It certainly stood them in
good stead now.
Scarcely need even for a light, though Bobby struck a match now and then
when they couldn’t remember the exact location of something they wanted.
“What are we going to carry them all in?” asked Fred, coming close to
Bobby. “I’ve got more than I can manage.”
“Here! Take this,” ordered Bobby briskly, and thrust something rough
into his hands. “It’s an empty sack,” he explained. “Dump everything
into it and we’ll sort the things out later.” In an amazingly short
space of time the feat had been accomplished, the longboat was fully
provisioned with ship’s biscuit, fresh water, and enough canned goods to
keep them going for a long time if they were careful.
“Pretty neat, I call it,” whispered Billy exultantly. “Got by the watch
without half trying. Say! What’s that?”
Some one was approaching slowly but steadily along the deck. They knew
by his peculiar stride that it was the second mate.
The boys did not linger to greet him. A moment later they had
disappeared, as completely as though the deck had opened and let them
through.