In the morning it was Dora who made an announcement that startled all of them. The girl had taken Captain Blossom’s spyglass and was looking across the bay in the direction of the wreck.
“There are men on board of the Golden Wave” she announced. “I can see them quite plainly.”
“Men on board of the wreck!” cried Dick. “Are you sure, Dora?”
“Look for yourself, Dick.”
The youth did so and saw that Dora was right. Half a dozen figures could be seen walking to and fro.
“Who are they?” asked Tom. “Lesher and his crowd?”
“That I can’t make out,” answered Dick, and handed over the glass to his brother.
All could see the men on the wreck, but at such a distance it was impossible to make out any faces.
“Maybe they are savages,” came from Grace.
“No, they are dressed like white people,” said Captain Blossom..
“Perhaps another ship has come in!” ejaculated Tom. “If it has, we are saved!”
“I don’t see any other ship,” said old Jerry.
“It may be on the other side of yonder island,” came from Sam.
“The best thing we can do is to row over and investigate,” said Captain Blossom. “If another ship has come in, the captain may claim that wreck and everything on board.”
A hasty breakfast was prepared and eaten, and it was agreed that the captain, Dick, and old Jerry should row over to the wreck in the best of the boats. The three were soon on the way, wondering whom they were to meet and what sort of a reception would be tendered to them.
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE MATE SHOWS HIS HAND
Captain Blossom had taken the spyglass along, and as they drew closer to the wreck he gazed long and earnestly at the men walking the deck of the Golden Wave.
“They are my crew,” he announced at last. “And they are in tatters.”
“They must have had a hard time of it since you were cast ashore,” said Dick.
“Unless I am mistaken, not a one of them is sober,” went on the captain. “They are cutting up like a band of wild Indians.”
Before long they were within hailing distance of those on the wreck. Then a voice from the rail hailed them.
“Boat ahoy!”
“Ahoy!” answered the captain.
“What do you want?” demanded the sailor on the wreck. He could scarcely talk straight.
“We want to come on board.”
“Sorry, cap’n, but I can’t let you come aboard,” answered the sailor, with something of a hiccough.
“Can’t let me come aboard?” repeated the captain. “Why not?”
“Cause it’s ag’in orders.”
“Whose orders?”
“Captain Lesher’s.”
“Captain Lesher!” ejaculated Captain Blossom indignantly. “How long has he been a captain?”
“We made him cap’n yesterday.”
“That’s right,” put in another sailor. “We ‘lected him unan—nan— nan’mously; yes, sir, unan—nan—nan’mously.”
“You are drunk, Bostwick.”
“No, sir, aint drunk at all.—Lesher, he’s drunk—but he’s cap’n all the same.”
“That’s right,” put in a third sailor. “Hurrah for Captain Lesher and the rum he let us have!”
“Got to keep off, I tell you,” went on Bostwick. “If you don’t, we have—er—we have strict orders to fire on you, yes, sir.”
“To fire on us!” cried Dick.—”Do you mean to say you would fire on us?”
“Now, see here, don’t you put in your oar,” said a fourth sailor. “You don’t count with us. It’s the cap’n that was we’re talkin’ to.”
“I am captain still,” said Captain Blossom firmly. “If you don’t want to obey me, you must leave the ship.”
“Aint going to leave no ship!” was the cry. “She belongs to us. You keep off!”
“Yes, yes, keep off!” added the others on the deck.
“The ship is mine,” said the captain. “If you refuse to let me come on board—”
At that moment two other figures appeared on deck.
“Dan Baxter and Jack Lesher!” murmured Dick.
“Captain Blossom, you had better keep your distance,” said Lesher in a voice that showed he was just getting over a spell of drunkenness.
“So you too refuse to let me come on board?”
“I do. The boys have made me their captain, and as such I am bound to look after their interests. I have told them what you proposed to do, and they don’t intend to stand it.”
“Didn’t I tell you we’d get square?” put in Dan Baxter, his evil face glowing with triumph. “We have all that is on board, and we mean to keep everything.”
“This is mutiny!” stormed Captain Blossom.
“Call it what you please,” answered Lesher recklessly. “I reckon I and the boys know what we are doing!”
“That’s right!” cried the half-drunken sailors. “Hurrah for Cap’n Lesher. He’s a man after our own hearts!”
“Supposing I demand to be let on board?” went on Captain Blossom.
“Don’t ye go, cap’n,” whispered old Jerry. “They are in jest a fit mood to kill ye. The rum has put the Old Nick in ‘em.”
“You can’t come on board, and that settles it,” roared Jack Lesher, drawing a pistol. “Keep your distance.”
“Yes, keep your distance,” added Baxter, and also showed a firearm.
“This is a fine way to treat us, after what we did for you,” said Dick. “But, wait, Baxter, the end is not yet.”
“Bah! I am not afraid,” said the bully. “These men are all my friends, and we know exactly what we are doing.”
“Do you expect to remain on the wreck?” asked the captain, after a moment of silence.
“That is our business,” answered Lesher.
“I think you will find that you are making a great mistake, men, to follow Lesher when you ought to follow me. I have always treated you fairly, and—”
“Hi! none of that!” roared the mate. “We won’t listen to it.”
“The men shall listen, if they will. I
“Say another word and I’ll fire!” cried the mate, and pointed his pistol at Captain Blossom’s head.
“Do-do you mean that?” asked the captain, in as steady a voice as he could command.
“Of course he means it,” said Dan Baxter. “He isn’t a fool. We are all going to stand by him, too,” he added.
“That’s right,” came from part of the crew. Dick noticed that a few of the others looked doubtful.
“I mean it, and I want you to leave right now,” stormed Jack Lesher. “I’ll give you one minute in which to turn your boat around,” and he pulled out his watch.
“Might as well go back,” whispered old Jerry. “You can’t reason with a lot of half-drunken men.”
“Very well, we’ll go back,” said Captain Blossom loudly. “But, remember, you haven’t seen the end of this affair.”
“And remember another thing,” added Dick, in an equally loud voice: “Don’t any of you dare to come anywhere near our house. If you do, you’ll be sorry for it.”
Then the three turned the boat around and rowed slowly back whence they had come.
“The rascals!” muttered Captain Blossom, when they were out of hearing. “Lesher and Baxter have poisoned the minds of the crew against me, and have bought over the men with liquor.”
“It’s a mighty good thing ye put them stores in the cave,” came from old Jerry. “If ye hadn’t we’d be a-wantin’ a good many things in a few days.”
“That is true,” answered Dick. “Dora told me they must have another barrel of flour by day after to-morrow.”
“How many at the cave?�
��
“Two.”
“Well, it certainly was a good job done,” said the captain. “But it makes me boil to think they want to keep me off my own ship. On the ocean that would be mutiny, and I could hang every mother’s son of them from the yardarm for it.”
“Lesher must have told ‘em some putty strong stories,” said old Jerry. “Otherwise the men wouldn’t be so dead set ag’in ye, cap’n.”
“No doubt he made out the strongest possible case.”
“I wonder if they will stick to the wreck all the time,” said Dick. “They’ll find it mighty hot when the sun shines.”
“Oh, they’ll most likely take some of the things ashore, and set up a camp nearby, Rover.”
“We’ll have to watch them closely.”
“I agree with you. Now we have two kinds of enemies—beasts and men,” and the captain laughed bitterly.
The others were gathered on the shore awaiting their return, and they listened attentively to what was told them.
“Oh, Lesher wanted to be leader, you could see that right off,” declared Tom. “And Baxter will do anything to make it disagreeable for us boys,” he continued.
“Well, there is one satisfaction,” said Nellie. “We haven’t Baxter with us.”
“If only a ship would stop here and take us away!” sighed Dora. To her it seemed like an age since they had landed on the seven islands.
“After this we must keep a regular guard,” announced Dick. “Unless we do that, somebody may play us foul when we least expect it.”
Slowly the day wore away. By the aid of the spyglass they could see the sailors still on the deck of the wreck. Nobody appeared to go ashore.
That night it fell to Sam’s lot to be on guard from nine to ten o’clock. The camp-fire was left burning brightly, and the youngest Rover sat near it on a log, a gun in his lap.
“No wild beast shall surprise me,” he told himself, and kept his eyes on the jungle back of the house.
His time for guard duty had almost come to an end when a noise down on the beach attracted his attention. By the faint light he made out a raft, which had just come in, bearing the figures of two sailors.
“Stop!” he called out. “Do not come closer at your peril!”
“Don’t shoot!” called back one of the sailors. “Don’t shoot! We mean no harm.”
Sam had backed up toward the house, and now he called to those within. He was soon joined by Captain Blossom, Dick, and several of the others.
“Who is it?” asked the captain, as he came forth, pistol in hand.
“Two of the sailors from the wreck, I think.”
“Don’t shoot us, captain,” called one of the men. “We are unarmed and want to talk with you.”
“They are Gibson and Marny,” said Captain Blossom. “They were generally pretty good sort of fellows. I reckon we have nothing to fear from them.”
“Are you alone?” called out Dick.
“Yes.”
“Then come up to the fire. But mind, no treachery.”
“We don’t wonder at your being on guard,” said the sailor named Gibson, a tall, thin Yankee. “The others treated you like so many dogs.”
“We have deserted Lesher,” put in Marny. “We came over here on the raft to see if you wouldn’t take us in.”
“Were you alone?” asked Captain Blossom.
“No, we had Hackenhaven with us. But he fell overboard just after we left the wreck, and the sharks caught him,” answered Gibson, with a bitter shake of his face.
“What did Lesher say to your leaving?” asked Tom.
“He didn’t know it until after we were a hundred yards or more from the wreck. You see, he and the others were drinking in the cabin, so we got away without much trouble,” answered Marny. “They might have shot at us, but it was too dark for them. We had a hard pull to get over here, and when poor Hackenhaven was gobbled up both of us felt bad, I can tell you.”
It was now seen that both sailors were almost exhausted, and Captain Blossom allowed them to rest, while Dick prepared a pot of coffee. While they were drinking, Gibson told them the particulars of how the mate had made himself leader of the sailors now left on the wreck.
CHAPTER XXIX
THE BURNING OF THE WRECK
“When Lesher and Baxter got back to where they left us they were very bitter against you,” began Gibson. “They told us that you had tried to make them work like niggers, fixing up this house. They said that they wanted to come right back and bring us here, but you wouldn’t let them go until the house was finished.”
“Which is not true, as all of us here know,” said Captain Blossom.
“Lesher also said that you were angry at us for leaving the ship before the rest, and that you had said you would have us all tried for mutiny the first chance you got. Baxter said the same, and also told us that you were going to dump all the rum and other liquor into the ocean, so that the mate and none of the others could get a drop of it while they stayed on the islands.”
“I didn’t say that, but I did say that Lesher Shouldn’t have all he wanted,” replied the captain.
“This sort of talk made most of the sailors wild,” went on Gibson. “Then Lesher made a speech to them, and they voted to stick by him through thick and thin and not let you rule them. He promised them all the liquor they wanted, and told them that if they stuck by him the whole lot could swear in court that they had found the wreck deserted, so that they could get whatever was coming in the way of salvage. Then he handed around some liquor he had brought along, and some pistols, and most of them said they would stick to him, as I said before.”
“What about going directly to the wreck?” asked Tom.
“That was Baxter’s idea, and it wasn’t thought of until we were on our way to this spot. Baxter said that if we captured the ship we would have you at our mercy, for sooner or later your provisions would run out, and you’d be begging for something to eat.”
“The scoundrel!” cried Dick. “So he thought to starve us into submission, eh? Well, he shan’t do it.”
“I said I didn’t think it would be fair on the young ladies,” continued Gibson. “But he told me he’d take care of the girls after he had brought you to your knees.”
“He’ll never take care of me!” cried Dora.
“Nor me!” came from Nellie.
“I’d rather die than leave this place in Dan Baxter’s company,” added Grace.
“Captain, I want you to understand that Gibson and I didn’t agree to what they wanted to do,” came from Marny. “But we were overruled, and we had to hold our tongues for fear of being knocked down or shot.”
“Do you want to join our crowd?” asked Dick bluntly.
“We do, and if you’ll take us in we’ll promise to stand by you to the end, no matter what comes. We know they’ve got the best of it—having the ship’s stores—but we don’t care for that. They are a drunken, good-for-nothing crowd, and we are done with them.”
“All right, men, I think we can trust you,” said Captain Blossom. “It’s a pity that Hackenhaven was lost overboard and eat up by the sharks. We could rather have spared Lesher.”
“Or Dan Baxter,” observed Tom.
“With three gone they have but eight men left on the wreck,” said Sam. “And we now number seven men and three ladies. If we stand our ground, I can’t see as we have much to fear from them.”
“It will be all right so long as they keep their distance,” said Captain Blossom. “But if they come over here in a body when they are half full of drink, there is sure to be a row and probably some shooting. Still, we needn’t try to meet trouble halfway.”
The sailors gave some more of the details of their doings while in Lesher’s company, and then they were provided with additional clothing, and each was given a pistol and some ammuniti
on. Nothing was said to them about the cave or the provisions stored there, Captain Blossom deeming it best to wait and make sure if they were to be thoroughly trusted.
“You see,” said he, “they may be straight enough, or they may be spies sent by Lesher to find out just what we propose to do.”
“They look honest,” said Dick. “I should trust them.”
The long pull on the bay had worn the two sailors out, and they were soon sleeping soundly. The girls followed, and then the boys started to turn in.
Sam had just gone to rest, and Tom was following, when Dick, who had stepped out on the beach, uttered a cry.
“What’s up?” asked Captain Blossom.
“Look toward the wreck. What does that light mean?”
The captain looked, and then ran for his spy-glass.
“The Golden Wave is afire!” he exclaimed. “That light is coming up out of the cabin!”
“The wreck is on fire!” shouted Tom, and this cry brought everybody out once more.
With remarkable rapidity the light grew brighter, until the heavens and the entire bay were lit up by the conflagration. There was a strong wind blowing, which carried the sparks to the jungle back of the ship. Listening intently, they could occasionally hear the roaring and crackling of the flames.
“The ship is doomed, that is certain,” said Sam. “I wonder if all who were on board escaped?”
“The fire has caught in the brushwood on the shore,” announced Captain Blossom, who had continued to use the spyglass.
“Can you see any of the men moving around?” questioned Dora.
“I thought I saw one or two, but I am not certain. Most of the men must have escaped, but if they were drunk, as Gibson says, perhaps some have been caught like rats in a trap.”
The flames continued to roar upward, and toward the island back of the ship, for over an hour. During that time they heard two dull explosions, caused by some barrels of chemicals catching fire. The second explosion sent the bits of burning wood and rigging flying in all directions.
“That will leave the mutineers without a home and without stores,” said old Jerry. “They’re in a poor fix now.”
“I’d like to know how the fire started,” said the captain. “Can you explain it?” he went on, to Gibson and Marny.
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