Motor Boat Boys' River Chase; or, Six Chums Afloat and Ashore

by Burt L. Standish

  CHAPTER XV

  JUST A MINUTE TOO LATE

  "Gee whiz!" exclaimed Buster, presently, and the others heard more orless of a loud crashing, which would seem to indicate that the fat boy,who was always rather clumsy in his movements, had stumbled and fallenamidst the impediments that sprinkled their course.

  "Hurt, Buster?" questioned Herb, who was close behind.

  "Naw, only knocked a little skin off my knees, I guess. Better luck nexttime," was the cheerful reply, as the unfortunate one scrambled to hisfeet, and again resumed his forward progress.

  When Jack and his five mates started off, the man Jenks, and hisemployer, Algernon Lorrimer, apparently did not mean to be left entirelyin the lurch. They were in the group now pushing through the wooded partof the island, and trying to surmount the many difficulties that besettheir course.

  Algernon had about as much trouble as Buster to navigate safely; now itwas some unnoticed log that threatened to trip him up, and again ahanging vine tried to choke him outright. Jenks hovered near by, readyto come to the rescue of his employer should the latter succeed ingetting into a severe pinch. As Josh afterward said in commenting onthis solicitude on the part of the machinist, perhaps Jenks had not beenpaid his week's wages as yet, and wanted to make sure he would have anemployer to whom he could look for the expected cash.

  One thing proved of considerable assistance, and this was the moon.Battered though it might be, and with one side partly gone, still thefaithful old sky lantern was able to give out a considerable amount ofsilvery light.

  "Lucky we've got that moon, let me tell you," grunted Buster, as hecontinued to boom along, making enough noise, so Josh declared, to warnthe whole neighborhood of their coming.

  "Some people'd need three moons to get along half way decent," was whatJosh declared from some point close by.

  "Hush!" Jack remarked, and at that they all fell quiet again.

  Indeed, it was no child's play making their way through the dense growththat covered the main part of the island. Even in the daytime theywould have had more or less trouble in accomplishing such a task; andwhen attempting it with only the deceptive moonlight as a source ofillumination, the task became doubly difficult.

  Once Jack called a brief halt.

  It was his idea to try and ascertain whether there were any soundsahead, such as might indicate the presence of busy workers, gettingtheir belongings from the boat that was about to be abandoned to the onethat had just fallen into their possession, through a stroke of luck,backed up by daring.

  It might be in the shape of voices, a cough, or any sort of sound thatwould betray the presence of human beings; why, even a sneeze, such asthat famous one of Buster, would do the business.

  But somehow nothing of the sort seemed to come to their strainedhearing; at any rate most of them failed to catch such a welcome sound.Yet when Jack bade them start on again, lowering his voice to athrilling whisper almost, it seemed as if he felt a new confidence,showing that he believed he had heard something or other.

  Instead of getting better the nearer they drew to the other side of thelittle island that had such a bad name, it seemed as though conditionssteadily became worse.

  Buster and Algernon simply could not hold up to the pace set by suchagile chaps as Jack, George, Andy and Josh, so that they were graduallybut surely falling back, and being put out of the race.

  Herb was not much better, for it was never a habit of the easy-goingskipper of the solid old Comfort to hurry more than he could reasonablyhelp.

  But then probably it would not matter so much after all. There werestill five in the front rank, for Jenks had now forged alongside theothers, thinking he might best serve his master by trying to recover theboat, rather than standing by to pick him up in case he fell. And morethan that, there was Jack handling that reliable Marlin of his in afashion that seemed to speak volumes for his intentions, once he sightedthe enemy.

  When excitement rules the camp it is wonderful how many things can becrowded into a small space of time. People seem to pass through alifetime in a few minutes, providing events come tumbling over oneanother, helter-skelter like.

  Now, when they came to figure upon it later on, the motor boat chumswere of the opinion that even under such adverse conditions they couldnot have been more than six or seven minutes in passing through thewooded center of the island. It was only a small affair at best, and bydaylight could have been crossed in much less time. And yet there wasBuster, for instance, who must have been laboring under the impressionthat fully half an hour had already passed since they first started tobreak into the thick growth, and butt up against all these crazyobstacles--the logs that would get under a fellow's feet, the encirclingloops of dangling wild grape-vines; the trees that bobbed up mostunexpectedly, and tried to knock one's brains out, and a lot of otherthings along the same line "too numerous to mention."

  Of course none of them gave much heed to what their conduct would bewhen they managed to overtake the enemy.

  That would have to be left pretty much to accident. Perhaps some ofthe boys, under the belief that they must present quite a hostileappearance, with all sorts of clubs and cudgels in evidence, not tospeak of that gun Jack carried, fancied that the two burglars would taketo flight at sight of the advancing legion. But Jack, and perhaps Herbalso, did not delude themselves with this expectation; for they couldremember just how that fellow aboard the stolen boat had warned Jenksoff, and even wounded him in the arm when he refused to stop short.

  They set him down as a dangerous character, which he undoubtedly musthave been, to have carried out the bold programme connected with thelooting of the up-river bank.

  At any rate, they must be getting close to the other side of the islandnow, for there was a perceptible slope downward, and this must mean thecrest had been left behind.

  Yes, and sure enough, the trees were getting less dense, though thebrush might be as thick as ever. Jack hoped for one thing that luckwould favor them, and allow of their breaking out upon the little beachat just the exact spot where the two men were working.

  At the same time he did not feel any too sanguine of success, for whichthere were numerous reasons. Surely the two thieves must be aware of thefact that the pack was pushing toward them, for there was plenty ofnoise accompanying their forward progress.

  And knowing this, would it not be the easiest thing for them to gaugetheir time of flitting by the closeness of the coming host? Jack thoughtso, even while still exerting himself to the uttermost in order to getto the shore as speedily as possible.

  Ah! now he could see more light ahead, which told in so many words thatthey must be close to the river again. Their troubles were behind themnow; that is, insofar as they concerned navigating the dense jungle thatcovered the island of the bad name.

  Those still ahead would be of an entirely different nature, and mightconsist of running up against the desperate thieves.

  Just then Jack heard a voice, a very gruff voice, which he recognized asbelonging to the man who had run off with the white boat.

  "That all, Jim?"

  The speaking of that name thrilled Jack, for only too well did heremember that it was mentioned in the newspaper article describing therobbery; and if he had had the slightest doubt before as to the identityof the precious pair, it was now a thing of the past.

  If the man addressed made any sort of reply Jack failed to catch it. Hehoped, however, that it would be of a negative character--that theymight still have something more to do; because Jack had located thevoice, and was of the impression that it came from a little further upthe narrow beach. They had come fairly close to the spot where thetransfer of belongings was being made, but did not hit on it exactly.And it is an old saying that a miss is as good as a mile; at any rate itwould likely prove such in this case.

  And so they presently burst out of the cover, and found themselveslooking on the moonlit surface of the flowing Mississippi again.

  Jack, Jenks, George and Josh had somehow
come out in a clump, with Andyclose at their heels. None of them more than cast a fleeting glance outon the dancing water, for they could see immediately that there wasnothing calculated to interest them there.

  Jack immediately turned up the beach, and started to sprint, for it wasopen here, and the absence of obstacles offered them a splendid chanceto do something worth while.

  There happened to be a little point setting out just above, on whichgrew some stunted trees and considerable brush. This helped to make acove, perhaps something like the one which the boys had selected astheir harbor, and in which the three motor boats rested snugly eventhen.

  And as the two fugitive thieves had chanced to come down that side ofthe island they must have picked this out for a stopping-place, wherethey could hide their craft.

  Rapidly did the running Jack, backed up by his allies, near this pointof land. Once it was reached, and he believed he would be able to seewhat lay beyond; though somehow Jack did not appear to entertain anydoubt as to the nature of this discovery.

  He had already reached its outer edge, and in another ten seconds musthave been able to push directly through, when, just as he feared, heheard sounds that announced the finish of that stage of the game.

  The loud crackle of a motor's exhaust broke the silence; and from therapidity with which it worked he knew that the engine had been startedat almost full speed.

  "Oh! rats!" burst out George, who had been doing his best to getalongside Jack, and succeeded too, "they've got away from us!"

  They kept on running, however, and speedily broke through the fringe ofshrubbery that shut off their view. As they did so it was to hear a loudhoarse laugh, that came rolling in from the water, and to see a whiteboat rushing away over the glistening surface of the river.