by Morgan Scott
CHAPTER XX.
GRANT TO THE RESCUE.
Piper’s trembling hands clutched Grant and clung to him.
“I’m going too,” said Sleuth huskily. “It’s ten to one this old hutcomes down in the storm. I wouldn’t stay here, anyhow.”
“I don’t reckon I would myself,” acknowledged Rod.
“Then,” said Piper, tugging at him, “we’d better hustle. If I knowSpringer, he won’t stop this side of Camp Oakdale, and we don’t want tobe left on this island with no way of getting off.”
“That wouldn’t be pleasant,” confessed Rod, “though I don’t opine Philwould desert us. He’ll wait for us.”
“Don’t you believe it,” spluttered Sleuth as they reached the open air.“If we want to stop him before he gets away with the canoe, we’ve got tomake tracks.”
Stumbling across the glade, they found the path, along which theydashed, Piper in advance. Reaching branches whipped them across theirfaces, and it seemed that the black thickets on every hand contained athousand menacing terrors. True, Grant was not as frightened as Piper,but the moment he began running he was overcome to some degree by thatfear-compelling sensation known to every boy who has fled in the darkfrom a menacing creation of his fancy. Occasional flashes of lightningserved only to blind them and make the ensuing gloom seem deeper andblacker. The thunder-shocks beat upon their ears, but as yet no rainfell.
Panting heavily, they came out suddenly upon the shore and realized theywere some distance from the place where the canoe had been left. In hisconfusion and excitement Sleuth turned in the wrong direction, but Grantchecked him by calling sharply:
“This way, Piper—the canoe is this way!”
“No,” said Sleuth, “you’re wrong; it’s this way.”
But, fearing to be left alone on that terrible island, he turned andfollowed Rod.
In a few moments they discovered Springer in the act of launching thecanoe, and Grant shouted at him angrily.
“What do you reckon you’re doing?” cried the exasperated Texan. “Are youtrying to run away and leave us, you coward?”
Phil’s face was almost ghastly, but he paused and waited for them. “Iwasn’t gug-going away,” he declared.
“It sure didn’t look like it!” retorted Rodney sarcastically.
“I was just gug-going to get the canoe into the water and wait for you,”explained Springer. “I’m gug-glad you’ve come. It isn’t raining yet,and——”
“But it will be right soon. We’re due to get a drenching if we startout.”
“We’ll get a dud-drenching if we stay here.”
“We might,” suggested Sleuth, with pretended bravado, “succeed infinding poor shelter beneath the thickest pines.”
“And a sus-soaking on the water won’t be any worse than one on land,”argued Phil.
“I was not thinking of the rain,” said Rod, casting a glance toward theblack, lightning-torn clouds; “it’s the wind we’ve got to reckon on. Wedon’t want to be swamped out in the middle of the lake.”
But now Piper joined Springer in urging him away, and, yielding, he gotinto the canoe and seized one of the paddles.
“Lively!” he ordered. “Get in and push off. Show what you’ve got in yourarms, Phil.”
“You bet I will,” promised Springer.
Away from the island shot the canoe, propelled by all the vigor theycould muster. Only a few rods had they paddled when there arose from thedepths of the pines the mournful howling of a dog, which was drowned byanother tremendous peal of thunder. Even this, however, could not spurthem to put more strength into the paddle strokes, for already they weredoing their best.
Their one object, now, was to do their utmost to reach Pleasant Pointbefore the storm should come upon them in all its fury, or at least toget as near the point as possible; for they knew that to be caught farfrom shore in the canoe while the open lake was being swept by such aburst of wind as often accompanies severe thunderstorms would be notonly most uncomfortable, but, in all probability, extremely perilous.
Between the thunder-claps they could hear afar in the mountains a lowand ominous moaning, but even Sleuth turned no backward glance towardthe black sky that seemed to shut down perpendicularly not far beyondthe white cross that marked Lovers’ Leap. As yet, although the surfaceof the lake was broken and dark, there seemed little wind, saveoccasional puffing blasts of short duration.
So intent were they upon their own business that it was some time beforethey perceived the small white sail of a boat somewhat to the right oftheir course. With each wind gust the sail filled and dipped, butbetween the puffs it was barely taut, and the boat, a tiny, punt-likeaffair, was moving slowly. Only one person could be seen, and he sat inthe stern of the boat, steering.
“That gent sure better hustle some,” observed Grant, “unless he’sanxious to get a proper ducking. If he has oars, he’s foolish not to usethem. We’re traveling twice as fast as he is, and we’ll soon be passinghim.”
“A fellow might think him dud-deaf and dud-dumb and blind,” saidSpringer. “If he hears or sees the storm, he’s a chump not to get a moveon.”
Piper opened his lips to make a remark, but a jagged, hissing spurt oflightning caused him to duck involuntarily and hold his breath, awaitingthe thunder that must follow. It came, crashing and flung back inreverberations from the mountains, and Sleuth shrugged his shoulders andshook his head.
“Next time I visit Spirit Island,” he declared, “I shall take specialpains to make sure there’s no thunderstorm on tap.”
“Nun-next time!” scoffed Phil. “I’ll bet there isn’t money enough tohire you to go there again.”
“Speak for yourself, my friend,” retorted Sleuth, “and judge not thecourage of others by your own cowardice.”
“Cowardice! Bah! You were sus-scared almost stiff.”
“But I didn’t run away.”
The moaning sound was growing louder and more distinct, changinggradually but swiftly to a suppressed, smothered roar. The black skyseemed to close over Lovers’ Leap and blot it out. The rain was coming,a few drops of the advance guard pattering around the canoe, in whichthe two paddle-wielders continued to exercise the full strength of theirarms.
They had been seen by Crane and Stone, both of whom were now standingwell out upon the point, watching them with no small anxiety.
Like the trio returning from Spirit Island, the person in thesail-driven boat seemed to be making for Pleasant Point, and they werenow so near that they recognized him as he, looking round, appeared todiscover them for the first time.
“Well, I’ll be dud-dished!” exclaimed Springer. “It’s our friend, JamesSimpson, Esquire. Seems to me he’s planning to make a cuc-call at ourcamp.”
“A right good time for him to come around if he intends to provokefurther trouble,” muttered Rodney. “I’d advise him to lower that sailand use his oars. I opine there’s going to be something doing in thehurricane line directly.”
“You bet,” agreed Piper, as the roaring sound increased with surprisingrapidity. “Here she comes now.”
“Hold the canoe steady, Phil,” admonished the Texan.
With a shriek the wind swept over them, tearing the surrounding waterinto foam. In a twinkling, almost, it struck the sail of Simpson’s boat,and in another twinkling the tiny craft upset, pitching its occupantinto the lake.
“I knew it, the chump!” cried Grant above the screaming of the wind.“He’s got his ducking ahead of the rainstorm.”
“Wonder if he can sus-swim?” shouted Phil apprehensively. “Don’t want tosee the pup-poor feller drowned.”
“He sure ought to know how to swim, living near this lake,” returnedRodney. “Where is he, anyhow?”
“There! there!” cried Sleuth, pointing, as a head appeared some distancefrom the capsized boat. “Look at the idiot! See him throw up his hands!Stone and Crane are shouting to us. Great marvels! He _can’t_ swim!”
Already, with a sweep of his paddle, Grant had pointed the canoe towardthe overturned boat and the youth who, splashing wildly only a shortdistance from it, seemed quite unable to reach and grasp it for support.
“Pull, Springer—pull for all you’re worth!” he commanded.
The driving blast of wind aided in speeding them toward the imperiledfellow.
“If he gets hold of this canoe he’ll upset it!” palpitated Piper.
Simpson’s head disappeared from view and was not seen again for severalmoments, after which his frantic efforts shot his body above the surfacehalfway to the waist line. Gulping, gasping, terrified by the experiencethrough which he was passing, the fellow turned his blanched face andappealing eyes toward the three boys who were now bearing down upon him.
Almost invariably persons who find themselves in deep water and cannotswim strive desperately to lift their bodies as high as possible andthus aid in their own undoing, and this was precisely what Jim Simpsondid. Had he simply paddled gently with his hands and held his breathwhenever his head went under, lacking in a rudimentary knowledge ofswimming though he was, he might have kept afloat for some moments; byhis tremendous struggles, however, he baffled himself and made itimperative that his would-be rescuers should reach him quickly.
“He’s gone—he’s gone again!” screamed Sleuth, as Grant once moreslightly altered the course of the canoe.
“Keep down! Keep low in the canoe and sit steady!” commanded Rodney.Then, rising, he did a difficult thing to do under the most favorablecircumstances; he dove headlong from the canoe without upsetting it.With three strong strokes beneath the water he reached Simpson, whosecollar he grasped with one hand at the back of the neck. They rosetogether, the Texan holding the other off and striking out as well as hecould for the capsized boat.
HE DOVE HEADLONG FROM THE CANOE WITHOUT UPSETTING IT. —Page 230.]
The excited boys watching from the point uttered a cheer. Then the rainswept over the lake in a tremendous blinding cloud, shutting from theirview the canoe, its occupants, and the two fellows in the water.
