Swept Out to Sea Part 7

I was not wholly a fool if I _was_ so well satisfied with my own smartness. My success in settling Mr. Chester Downes had of course given me an inflated opinion of myself; but I knew better than to overlook the possibility of my cousin being able to do me some mean trick, especially with the help of the two fellows he was with.

When Crab Bolster and I set off in the skiff for the Wavecrest, I saw Paul and his friends make for the ferry, and while I helped pull the skiff in the drizzle of rain that swept across the harbor, I saw the three board the ferryboat and land at the dock on the Neck near which we lived.

I made Crab hustle the goods aboard and stowed all away in the cuddy before I let the boatman put me ash.o.r.e. Paul and his friends were hanging about the landing.

"Keep your eye on my Wavecrest, will you, Lampton?" I said to the man who owned the landing, and kept boats for hire. "Remember, n.o.body's to go aboard of the sloop without my special permission," and I glanced pointedly at my cousin.

"I'll see to that, sir," said Lampton, who was my friend, I knew. "And in this weather, and with the wind the way she is, anybody would be crazy to want to take a boat out through the breach."

I went back to the house in ample time for dinner, and Ham, who had been on the watch, reported that my uncle had not again tried to enter the house. But I was worried about Paul and his henchmen. I couldn't rest in the house after dark. If they couldn't get a boat on the Neck side of the harbor in which to go out to the Wavecrest, they might come across from the town side and do her some damage.

Mother had come down to dinner and we had one of our old-fashioned, homey meals, followed by a pleasant hour in the drawing-room, where she played and sang for me. It was her pleasure that I should dress for dinner just as though company was to be present, and she trained me in the niceties of life, and in bits of etiquette, for which I have often, in later times, been very thankful. For although I found my amus.e.m.e.nt in rough adventure and my companionship for the most part among seamen and fishermen, it hurts no boy or man to be as well grounded in the tenets of polite society as in writing, reading, and arithmetic!

The subject that was uppermost in my mind--that hazy mystery surrounding my father's death--did not come up between us on this evening. Nor did the unpleasant topic of the Downeses come to the fore. I am very, very glad to remember that my mother looked her prettiest, that she gave me the tenderest of kisses when she bade me goodnight early, and that we parted very lovingly.

I went up to my room, but only to put on a warmer suit--a fishing suit in fact. I shrugged myself into oilskin pants and jacket, too, in the back shed, and exchanged my cap for a sou'wester. Then I sallied forth through a pelting rain, with the gale whistling a sharp tune behind me, and descended the hill toward the point off which the Wavecrest was moored.

I had said nothing to anybody about my intention. I do not think that any of the servants saw me go. I left my home without any particular thought of the future, or any serious cogitation as to what would be the result of my act.

Merely, I had put two and two together in my mind--and I would sleep aboard the Wavecrest.

CHAPTER VIII

IN WHICH AN EXPECTED COMEDY PROVES TO BE A TRAGEDY

I knew well enough that my cousin, Paul Downes, was too thoroughly scared by my threat to have him arrested for a.s.sault, to openly make an attack upon either my boat or myself. But his money could bribe such fellows as I had seen him with that very day, to sink the Wavecrest, or even to a.s.sault me in the dark.

It would be a joke on Paul--so I thought--if he or his friends should sneak out to the sloop where she was moored, intending to do her some harm, and find me there all ready for such a visitation. I chuckled to myself while I wended my way to the sh.o.r.e, carrying a single oar with me, and unlocked the padlock of the chain which fastened my rowboat to the landing.

There was n.o.body about, and I pushed out and sculled over to the Wavecrest without being interfered with. Had I not known so well just where the sloop lay I declare I would have had trouble in finding her.

It was the darkest kind of a night and it _did_ blow great guns! The rain pelted as sharp as hail and before I got half way to the sloop I decided that I wasn't showing very good sense, after all, in coming out here on such a night. I didn't think Paul and his friends would venture forth in such a storm.

However, having once set out to do a thing I have usually run the full course. I am not sure that it is natural perseverance in my case, but fear that I am more often ashamed to be considered fickle. So I sculled on to the Wavecrest and prepared to go aboard.

But just here I bethought me that if my cousin should attempt to board the sloop he would be warned that I was aboard by the presence of the tender. Therefore I snubbed the nose of the rowboat up short to the float, and then, after getting into the bows of the Wavecrest I let go her cable and paid out several yards so that the float and the tender were both out of sight in the darkness.

I chuckled then, as I crept aft to the c.o.c.kpit and unlocked the door of the little cabin. Once inside, out of the rain, I drew curtains before all the lights and then lit the lamp over the cabin table. There were four berths, two on each side, with lockers fore and aft. Altogether the cabin of the Wavecrest was cozy and not a bad place at all in which to spend a night.

It was still early in the evening. The tide had not long since turned and was running out, while the wind out of its present quarter was with the tide. Any craft could sail out of Bolderhead harbor this night with both gale and sea in its favor; but heaven help the vessel striving to beat into the inlet! The reefs and ledges along this coast are as dangerous as any down on the charts.

The Wavecrest pitched a good bit at the end of her cable. I made up my bed and arranged the lamp in its gimbals near the head of the berth, and so took off my outer clothing and lay down to read. I did not think that the lamplight could be seen from without, even if a boat came quite near me. Being so far in-sh.o.r.e I had lit no riding light. It was unnecessary at these moorings.

I did not read for long. Used to the swing of the sea as I had been for years the bucking of the Wavecrest as she tugged at her cable, put me to sleep before I had any idea that I was sleepy. And my lamp was left burning.

I do not know how long I was unconscious--at least, I did not know at the moment of my awakening; but suddenly something b.u.mped against the sloop's counter. I thought when I opened my eyes:

"Here they are! Now for some fun."

I supposed they would not have seen my light and I was going to put my head out of the cabin and scare them before they could do the Wavecrest any harm.

But as it proved, the b.u.mping of the small boat against the sloop did not announce the arrival of the enemy. Almost instantly--I had not got into my trousers, indeed--there came a great hammering at the cabin door.

I did not speak, although at first I supposed the rascals were knocking to arouse me. Then it shot across my bewildered mind that somebody was nailing up the cabin door!

"h.e.l.lo there! stop that!" I bawled, getting interested in the proceedings right away.

But there was no answer, unless certain whisperings that I could not understand could be considered as such. Several long nails--twenty-penny, I was sure--were driven home. Then there was a clattering of boots and the small boat b.u.mped the sloop's counter again.

They were getting into their own boat. They had left me in a nice fix--nailed up tightly in the cabin of my boat. I was mad 'way through; instead of playing any joke on Paul Downes and his friends, they had played me a most scurvy trick.

But it was only comedy as yet--comedy for them, at least. I was pretty sure that they had fixed me in the cabin, not only for the night, but until somebody pa.s.sing in a boat would see me signalling from the tiny deadlights. And goodness only knew when the gale would subside enough to tempt any other boatman out upon the bay.

The sloop was still pitching at the end of her cable. I could feel the tug of the moorings as my enemies got into their boat. Then--in half a minute, perhaps--there was a startling change in the sloop's action. She leaped like a horse struck with a whip and instantly began to roll and swing broadside to the gale.

I knew at once what had happened. The cable had parted; the Wavecrest was adrift!

The discovery alarmed me beyond all measure. I was panic-stricken--I admit it. And I earnestly believe that almost any other person who had a love of life within them would have felt the same.

For to be adrift in Bolderhead Harbor on such a night, with the wind and tide urging one's craft out toward the broad ocean, while one was nailed up in the cabin and unable to do a thing toward guiding the boat, was a situation to shake the courage of the bravest sailor who ever was afloat.

I believed I had n.o.body but myself to thank for the accident. In letting out the cable by which the sloop was moored, I had increased the strain upon it. I should have thrown out a stern anchor as well when I came aboard the Wavecrest to spend the night. The tug of wind and tide had been too much for the single cable.

And now my bonnie Wavecrest was swinging about, broadside to the sea, and likely to be rolled over completely in a moment. If she turned turtle, what would become of me? The air in the cabin was already foul.

If she turned topsyturvy, and providing she was not cast upon the rocks and smashed, I would be in difficulty for fresh air in a very few hours.

These possibilities--and many others--pa.s.sed through my mind in seconds of time. I had no idea that one's brain could work so rapidly. A hundred possible happenings, arising from my situation, entered my mind in those first few moments while the Wavecrest was swinging about.

Fortunately, however, although she went far over on her beam ends, and I expected to hear the stick snap, she righted, headed with the tide, and began to hobble over the seas at a great rate. I had dressed completely ere this, and was trying my best to open the cabin door. If I could get to the centerboard and drop it, I believed the sloop would ride better and could be steered.

Those rascals had nailed the door securely, however. The slide in the deck above was fastened on the outside too. I was a prisoner in my own boat and she was being swept out to sea as fast as a northwest gale and a heavy tide could carry her.

CHAPTER IX

IN WHICH I SEE THE DAY DAWN UPON A DESERTED OCEAN

I don't claim to possess an atom more courage than the next fellow. I was heartily scared the instant I realized that the Wavecrest was adrift and I was fastened into her cabin. But I was not made helpless by my terror.

I tried my best to open that cabin door; but the big nails had been driven home. The ports were too small for my body to pa.s.s through, although I did open one and was tempted to shriek for help. But that would have been a ridiculous thing to do--and useless, as well. Had anybody heard and understood my need, I was beyond a.s.sistance from land, and there was n.o.body out in the harbor but myself, I felt sure.

The Wavecrest had got well out into the harbor now. She rolled very little and therefore I knew that, unguided as she was, her head was right and wind and tide were sweeping her on. She might be piled up on either sh.o.r.e at the mouth of the inlet; but from the start I believed she would be shot through the outlet of the harbor into the open sea.