Dave Fearless and the Cave of Mystery Part 4

"Oh--oh!" said Bob slowly, studying it. "N-no," he continued, quite as slowly. "Yes--no. H'm! One minute the face looks familiar, the next it looks strange. I can't fix it, although it seems as if I've seen that man before."

"You have," declared Dave. "Here, Mr. Stoodles, you take a try."

"Yes, there's the pilot," announced Stoodles. "The other is the ould p.a.w.nbroker that was on the _Raven_."

Dave's face grew eager and bright with satisfaction.

"Good for you," he said. "I knew I was right. Yes, that is the man the Hankers picked up at San Francisco--a p.a.w.nbroker named Gerstein. He furnished some of the money to fit out their ship for the expedition.

Well, my friends, Gerstein, under the false name of Schmitt-Schmitt, is now on this island."

"Then the _Raven_ crowd escaped!" exclaimed Bob.

"I don't know that," answered Dave. "I do know that Schmitt-Schmitt appeared here a few days ago. He has been trying to engage a ship to go after a fortune he says he can find. Of course it's our treasure."

"The spalpane! Of coorse it is!" cried Stoodles excitedly.

"My theory," went on Dave, "is that the _Raven_ was terribly disabled or lost in the cyclone. I am also pretty sure that the treasure was saved.

Perhaps it was already hidden somewhere on land. At all events, Schmitt-Schmitt was in the secret, either as the partner and emissary of others of the _Raven_ crowd or on his own account. He managed to get a small boat afloat, was taken up by a liner, and landed here. Now his whole time is given, as I said, to finding a ship that will go after a fortune, as he terms it, on shares."

"Your theory is raisonable, your theory is right," insisted Stoodles.

"Schmitt-Schmitt," proceeded Dave, "made friends with the governor here.

He seems to be staying at the pilot's house. When the _Swallow_ was sighted he at once reasoned it out that we had discovered the real contents of those four boxes, that we might be bound straight back for the Windjammers' Island. He induced the pilot to run us onto the sunken brig in the creek."

"Dave, I believe you've got this matter just right," said Bob thoughtfully.

"If that is true," continued Dave, "they will do all they can to delay us. Who knows but what this rascally governor and his crew may intend to take the _Swallow_ away from us and furnish Schmitt-Schmitt with the very means he wants to go after the treasure, with no chance of being followed?"

"Dave, have you told Captain Broadbeam about all this?" inquired Bob anxiously.

"I haven't had the chance. I learned what I have told you only in the past hour," responded Dave. "As soon as we return to the _Swallow_, though, I shall warn him. I had a purpose in coming ash.o.r.e."

"Are we to help you, Dave?" asked Bob.

"All hands must help. I want to locate the pilot's house, I want to be sure that this Schmitt-Schmitt is really there and that he is the same fellow we knew as Gerstein on the _Raven_."

"That's easy," declared Stoodles. "The picture gives us a hint as to the house."

"We will separate so as to excite no notice or suspicions," directed Dave. "Let each one of us find out all he can, and report at this spot in three hours."

"In three hours be it," nodded Stoodles, looking very businesslike.

"All right," a.s.sented Bob, taking another good look at the picture of the pilot's house.

Dave allowed his two friends to select their own course. Then, when they were out of sight, he took an independent route.

He surmised that the pilot would probably live near the water's edge.

In this he found his calculations correct, and an hour's search brought some results.

"That is the house," spoke Dave finally, peering from a clump of thick high bushes. "Yes, there is the very bench the pilot and Schmitt-Schmitt sat on when Mr. Adair took their picture."

Before Dave lay a ground plot of considerable extent and fairly smothered in luxurious vegetation, sloping down to the beach. In its center was a lone hut, open and rambling, and having a broad porch that ran clear around it.

It was a typical tropical habitation of the poorer cla.s.s. No one seemed stirring about the place except far back in the rear. Here there was a thick plantation of high resinous bushes. One man was feeding these into a rude grinding mill operated by a big lazy mule treading in a circle.

Dave stood quietly in his place of concealment for fully half an hour.

The man drove his mule away. The place seemed now entirely deserted.

However, just as Dave was about to leave the spot someone came out on the front porch.

"It's the man. Yes, sure, it is Gerstein--Schmitt-Schmitt!" said Dave.

Schmitt-Schmitt was dressed in a thin linen suit. He carried a large but light wicker valise. This he set down beside a bench, looked at his watch, then in the direction of the town, and stretched himself out lazily in a hammock.

"Looks as if he was going away," mused Dave, critically a.n.a.lyzing all the movements of the person he was spying on. "Looks too as if he was expecting and waiting for somebody--probably the pilot."

Dave thought out the situation and its possibilities for about five minutes. He decided to go back to the yawl. Then he realized that he would be considerably interested in hearing what the pilot and his guest might say when they met.

Schmitt-Schmitt lay with his back to Dave. On this account, and because of the shelter of many shrubs and bushes, Dave found it no task at all to cover the s.p.a.ce unnoticed between his present hiding-place and the porch.

Its floor was nearly two feet from the ground. Dave crawled way back under this open s.p.a.ce, got pretty nearly under the hammock, and lay on his back. The porch boards were badly warped and splintered, and he could look right up at the hammock and its occupant.

At the end of about ten minutes Dave heard footsteps coming up the graveled walk. He turned his eyes sideways and was gratified to recognize the pilot.

"Whew, this is hot!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the owner of the place, stamping heavily across the porch and throwing himself into a chair near the hammock, in which Schmitt-Schmitt now arose to a sitting posture. Then the speaker glanced in the direction of the plantation where Dave had noticed the treadmill.

"Ah," continued the pilot, with an angry scowl. "That lazy rascal has ceased making the frew-frew? I will cut him half a day's pay."

"Yes, it is hot," answered his guest. Each of the precious twain had a language of his own, so they compromised on very broken English.

"What you done?" asked Schmitt-Schmitt. The pilot chuckled and grinned from ear to ear.

"I have undone," he said gleefully. "Have I not? But the governor went too far. He charged them prices for repairing the _Swallow_ the captain wouldn't stand, and he is doing his own repairing."

"He is?" cried Schmitt-Schmitt, in a tone of alarm. "He is quick, smart. He will be off in twenty-four hours."

"Not at all," declared the pilot calmly. "You wish him delayed? Delay it shall be, a long delay. Delay after delay. Only--my pay must come.

The governor's too. We are exceeding the law for you."

"Both of you shall be rich--rich! As soon as I get my fortune,"

promised Schmitt-Schmitt recklessly. "Have you found out for me yet--do they think they have the treasure aboard the _Swallow_?"

"They have just found out differently, my spies tell me," said the pilot.

"Then they will go right back to search for it," declared Schmitt-Schmitt. "I know them--plucky fellows, all. They must be stopped."

"Fear not. As I told you," interrupted the pilot calmly, "that end of it is easy. I hope your getting the treasure is as simple."

"Get these fellows out of the way, get me a ship, and I will show you,"

said Schmitt-Schmitt eagerly.