The Rival Campers Part 8

The fire soon became plainly visible. At a point where the path divided he could see the white tent, lit up by a big fire of driftwood that blazed in front of it. He could hear the sound of voices, and distinguished that of Harvey above the others. There seemed to be some insubordination in camp, for Harvey's tones were loud and angry.

Tom concluded not to take the path to the left, which was the one leading direct to the camp, but continued on for a distance along the main path.

It was well he did so, for presently he heard some one coming toward him.

The paths were at this point so near together that he could not distinguish which one the person was taking; so he drew aside and crouched in the bushes, which were very dense between the two paths. A boy, whom he recognized as Tim Reardon, soon came in sight, and pa.s.sed close by the spot where Tom was concealed. He carried a pail in his hand, and was evidently going to a spring near by for water. He was grumbling to himself as he pa.s.sed along.

"I'm always the one!" he said. "Why don't he make some one else lug the water part of the time? I'm not going to be bullied by any Jack Harvey, and he needn't think I am."

He kept on to the spring, however. Tom remained where he was, and Tim soon returned, carrying the pail filled with water. Tom waited till he saw Tim arrive at the camp and deposit the pail of water near the fire, before he again emerged from the clump of bushes into the path that led past the camp. He followed this cautiously. He could not as yet see whether all the members of the crew were present about the camp-fire, and he knew that to encounter any one of them at that hour near the camp would not only put an end to all hopes of recovering the box, by revealing to Harvey and his crew that he suspected them of having stolen it, but that, once an alarm being given, he should have the whole crew at his heels in a twinkling.

Tom was sufficiently acquainted with the reputation of Harvey's crew to know that it would go hard with him if they found him there. He stole quietly along past the camp some little distance, and then, turning from the path, got down on his hands and knees and crept toward the camp through the bushes.

Near the camp was a hemlock-tree, with large, broad, heavy branches, that grew so low down on the trunk that some of them rested on the ground. It offered a place of concealment, and Tom, at the imminent risk of being discovered, reached it and crawled in between the branches. If the campers had been expecting any one, and had been on the watch, he must surely have been discovered, for several times branches cracked under him, and once so loudly that he thought it was all up with him, expecting them to come and see what had made the noise. But they took no notice of it, either because they were accustomed to hearing noises in the woods, of cattle or dogs, or thought nothing at all about it.

From where he now lay, Tom could see the entire camp, and hear everything the boys said. It was a picturesque spot which Harvey had chosen. The land here ran out in one of those irregular points which was characteristic of the sh.o.r.es of the island, and ended in a little, low-lying bluff, that overlooked the bay. On the side nearer the village, the sh.o.r.e curved in with a graceful sweep, making a perfect bow, and the land for some distance back sloped gradually down to the beach. The beach here was composed of a fine white sand, making an ideal landing-place for rowboats. On the side farther from the village, the waterfront was of a different character. It rounded out, instead of curving in, and the sh.o.r.e was bold, instead of sloping. It was not easily approached, even by small boats, as the water, for some distance out, was choked up with reefs and ledges, which were barely covered at high tide, and at low water were exposed here and there.

This apparently unapproachable sh.o.r.e had been taken advantage of by Harvey in a way which no one in the village had ever suspected. There was a channel among the reefs, which a small sailboat could pursue, if one were accurately acquainted with its windings. With this channel, which they had discovered by chance, the campers had become thoroughly familiar, at both low and high water.

The point had been cleared of undergrowth, and most of the larger trees had been cut down for some little distance back from the water. In the rear of this clearing there were thick woods, extending into the island for a mile or more.

The campers had pitched a big canvas tent at the edge of the clearing, where they lived in free and easy fashion, cooking mostly out-of-doors.

They scorned the idea of making bunks, as smacking too much of civilization, and at night slept on boughs covered with blankets. They lived out-of-doors in front of the tent when the weather was pleasant, and, when it was stormy, they went aboard the yacht and did their cooking in the cabin, over a small sheet-iron stove.

It was altogether a romantic and picturesque sight that Tom saw as he looked out from his hiding-place. At a little distance from the tent the fire was blazing, while the members of the crew either sat around it or lay, stretched out at full length, upon the ground. A pot of coffee was placed on a flat stone by the side of the fire, near enough to get the heat from it, and the delicious odour of it as it steamed made Tom hungry.

The members of Harvey's crew were utterly without restraint, saving that which was imposed capriciously by Harvey himself. Harvey was not naturally vicious. His mind had been perverted by the books he had read, so that he failed to see that his acts of petty thievery were meannesses and acts of cowardice of which he would some day be ashamed.

He fashioned his conduct as much according to the books he read as possible, and, if he had been but trained rightly, would have been proud to do courageous things, instead of playing mean jokes, for he had at heart much bravery. He rarely wore a hat, and was as bronzed as any sailor. The sleeves of his flannel blouse were usually rolled up to the elbows, showing on his forearms several tattooed designs in red and blue ink. He was large and strong.

The boys around the fire were telling stories and relating in turn incidents of adventure that had taken place since their arrival on the island. At the close of their story-telling, they arose and began making preparations for a meal. Near by the fireplace they had built a rough table, of stakes driven into the ground, and boards, with benches on either side of it, fashioned in the same way. Two of the boys went to the tent and brought out some tin dishes, and the steaming pot of coffee was taken from the stone and set on the table.

Then Joe Hinman, taking a long pole in his hand, went to the fire and proceeded to scatter the brands about, while a shower of sparks rose up and floated off into the forest. Presently Joe raked from among the embers a dozen or more black, shapeless objects. These he placed one by one on a block of wood and broke the clay-for such it was-with a hatchet.

The odour of cooked fish pervaded the camp and saluted Tom's nostrils most temptingly. Inside of the lumps of clay were fish of some kind, which Tom took to be cunners. As fast as they were ready, Tim Reardon carried them to the table, where they were heaped up on a big earthen platter.

The boys then fell to and ate as though they were starving. Tom wondered for some time if this could be their usual hour for supper; but remembered that he had seen the _Surprise_ several miles off in the bay that evening, and concluded that the evening meal had been long delayed.

The _Surprise_ now lay a few rods offsh.o.r.e, with a lantern hanging at her mast.

The boys continued to talk, as they ate, of tricks they had played and of raids they had taken part in, down the island. In fact, the good citizens of Southport would have given a good deal for the secrets Tom learned from his hiding-place that night. Tom waited impatiently, however, for some mention of the missing box. Could he be mistaken in suspecting them of having taken it? No, he was sure not. That they were capable of doing so, their own conversation left no room for doubt. Tom felt certain the box was in their possession.

But he began to feel that his errand of discovery to-night would be fruitless. They must, he argued, have some sort of storehouse, where they hid such plunder as this, but no one had as yet made the slightest mention of it. It was clearly useless for him to grope about in the vicinity of the camp at night, and he began to think it would be better after all to wait until day and select a time for his search, if possible, when all the members of the crew were off on the yacht. But that might come too late, and Tom wondered what to do.

All at once Joe Hinman made a remark that caused Tom to raise himself upon his elbow and listen intently.

"Boys," said Joe, "I've got a little surprise for you."

The crew, one and all, stopped eating, rested their elbows on the table, and looked at Joe curiously.

"I'll bet it's a salmon from old Slade's nets," said George Baker. "Joe's sworn for a week that he'd have one."

"He's all right, is Joe," remarked Harvey, patronizingly. "There isn't one of you that can touch Joe for smartness."

Thus encouraged, Joe told how he had seen the box that had been a part of Tom's and Bob's luggage left on the wharf the night it arrived; how he had ascertained that it contained food, by prying up the cover; and how, early on the following morning, he had rowed up under cover of the fog, and had brought back the box to the camp.

"It's down in the cave now," said Joe. Tom gave a start. "There's a meat-pie in it that is good for a dinner to-morrow, and a big frosted cake, if you fellows want it to-night."

"Hooray!" cried Jack Harvey. "You and I will go and get it." Whereupon he and Joe sprang up and made directly for the spot where Tom lay, pa.s.sing by so close that he could have reached out and touched them, and hurried along the bank, down to the sh.o.r.e.

Tom allowed them to get well in advance before he ventured to crawl from his hiding-place and follow them. He saw them at length disappear over the bank at a point where there grew a thick clump of cedars. He turned from the path into the woods, made his way cautiously past the place where he had seen them disappear, turned into the path again, and then climbed down the bank, which was there very steep, holding on to the bushes, and looked for the boys, but they were nowhere to be seen.

Tom knew they could not have pa.s.sed him. They had not reappeared over the edge of the bank, and they were nowhere in sight along the sh.o.r.e. There could be but one conclusion. The entrance to the cave must be located in the clump of cedars.

It seemed to Tom that he had waited at least a quarter of an hour, though, in fact, it was not more than five minutes, when he saw the boys reappear. Tom groaned as he saw the big cake in Joe's hand. Joe laid it down on the ground, while he and Jack picked up several armfuls of loose boughs lying about, and threw them up carelessly against the bank. Then Joe took up the cake again, and they emerged from the cedars, climbed up over the bank, and disappeared in the direction of their camp.

Tom lost no time in scrambling to the spot. The hiding-place was cunningly concealed. It was an awkward place to crawl to from any part of the bank, and no one would have thought of trying to land there in a boat. The entrance to the cave might have been left open, with little chance of its ever being discovered. Tom threw aside the boughs sufficiently to discover that beneath them was a sort of trap-door, made of pieces of board carelessly nailed together. Then he replaced the boughs and, without even attempting to lift the board door, regained the path at the top of the bank.

"There'll be time enough to explore that later," he muttered. "I'm not the only one that will have lost something out of that cave before morning, though." He made his way cautiously past the camp once more, and then started on a run for his own camp. His hare and hounds practice at school stood him in good stead, and he did not stop running till he had come to the door of his tent. He unfastened the flap and entered, panting for breath. Bob was sleeping soundly. He shook him, but Bob was loath to awake, and resented being so roughly disturbed.

"Wake up, Bob! Wake!" cried Tom, shaking him again.

Bob opened his eyes. "Why, is it morning, Tom?" he asked.

"No, it isn't, Bob, but it soon will be. I've found the box, Bob.

Harvey's got it, and I know where it is hidden,-down near his camp in a cave."

Bob shivered, for Tom had pulled the blanket off the bed, and the moist sea air penetrated the tent. He dressed, stupidly, for he was not fully rid of his drowsiness.

The boys went down to the beach, and Bob washed his face in the salt water.

"I'm all right now, Tom, old fellow," he said, "but, honest, Tom, I feel ugly enough at being waked up, not at you, though, to just enjoy a fight with those fellows."

"There's little prospect of that, if we are careful," answered Tom. "What we want to do is to show them we are smart enough to get the box back, and, perhaps, play them a trick of our own."

Then they carried the canoe down to the sh.o.r.e, launched it, and set off.

It was about one o'clock in the morning. They paddled away from the tent and down along the sh.o.r.e, noiselessly as Indians. Past the village and past the cottages, and not a sign of life anywhere, not even a wisp of smoke from a chimney. The canoe glided swiftly along, making the only ripples there were on the gla.s.sy surface of the bay.

As they came to the beach near Harvey's camp, they landed, and Tom crept up over the bank to reconnoitre. He came back presently, reporting that the crew were all sound asleep, and everything quiet around the camp.

Then they paddled quickly by the end of the bluff and along the bold sh.o.r.e beyond, picking their way carefully among the reefs, as they could not have done in these unknown waters with any other craft than the buoyant canoe.

They disembarked at the clump of cedars, and made the canoe fast to the trunk of one that overhung the water. Tom took from the bow of the canoe a lantern, and they scrambled up the bank. Throwing aside the boughs, they disclosed the trap-door, which they lifted up. Tom lit the lantern and they entered the cave.

They found it much larger than the opening indicated. It was excavated from the hard clay of which the bank was composed, and, though not high enough for them to stand quite erect, it was about eight feet long and five feet wide.

It was filled with stuff of all sorts. There were spare topsails and staysails,-possibly from coasters that had anch.o.r.ed in the harbour,-sets of oars from ships' boats, several boxes of canned goods, that the grocer of the village had hunted for far and wide, coils of rope, two shotguns, carefully wrapped in pieces of flannel and well oiled, to prevent the rust from eating them, four lanterns, two axes and a hatchet, and odds and ends of all descriptions useful in and about a camp or a yacht.

The roof of the cave was sh.o.r.ed up with boards, supported by joists. In one corner of the cave was the box for which they sought, broken into, and with the gorgeous cake gone; but that was all. The rest of the contents were untouched.

They took the box, carried it down to the sh.o.r.e and placed it in the canoe. Tom started to return to the cave.

"What are you going to do now, Tom?" queried Bob. "We don't want to take anything of theirs, of course."