CHAPTER XXII.
BEN STUBBS DISAPPEARS.
Left behind at Camp Walrus, Billy Barnes, Lathrop, and Ben Stubbswatched the _Golden Eagle II_ until she became a bird-like speck againstthe intense blue of the Florida sky.
"Good luck to them," cried Billy, a wish that was echoed by all the"stay-at-homes," as Lathrop had dubbed them.
"Come on, Lathrop," said Billy, the second morning after the aeroplanefaded from view, "let's get the guns and go for a hunt. I'm sure I hearda wild turkey in the brush yonder a while ago, and Ben can mount guardover the wireless while we are gone."
"Do you think that will be all right?" questioned Lathrop dubiously,"you know I'm the only one in the camp that can operate the instrumentand I think I ought to keep within reach of it."
"You're right," rejoined Billy. "It will be better for Ben and I to go."
Ben agreed with alacrity, the old prospector was never better pleasedthan when there was an opportunity to hunt, and he hastened to oil uphis gun and fill his cartridge belt.
"Hold on a minute," said Ben, as he and Billy Barnes started out, "I'mtoo old a woodsman to go into the woods without agreeing on a signal ifanything happens. We'll use the old hunter's warning. If we need you,Lathrop, or you need us, we are to fire first one shot then a pause andthen two shots in rapid succession and keep it up till we get an answer.We'll be back to dinner."
"All right," replied Lathrop, "though I don't see just what trouble youcan get into here, and as for me, I am all right I guess--so long."
Left alone Lathrop took his fountain-pen and--though he had no idea whenhe could post it--began the composition of a long letter home. He was soengrossed with this employment that he did not notice the hour, and itwas not till Pork Chops summoned him to lunch that he recalled with astart that the two hunters were still away. However, he assured himselfit was probable that they had found good hunting in some distant part ofthe island and that they had not, like himself, realized how late it wasgetting.
This done he walked uneasily up and down, waiting impatiently for thereturn of the hunters. He was really anxious and could no longerdisguise from himself the fact that something of a serious nature musthave happened to keep them out away so long. His mind ran the gamut ofevery accident, from snake-bite to accidental shooting, but he was asfar from guessing the real truth as he was from being at ease in hismind.
"Bang!" A long pause--then again, "Bang--Bang."
It was the alarm signal agreed upon by Ben Stubbs before the huntersleft camp.
The reports came from some distance in the forest, and Lathrop, hastilygetting his gun and half crazy with anxiety, answered it as soon as hecould slip in the cartridges.
What could have happened?
Firing frequently and being answered at closer intervals all the time,Lathrop advanced into the jungle and had not proceeded very far when heencountered a strange figure.
It was Billy Barnes, but a white-faced Billy, his clothes torn bycreepers and his face scratched and cut by his wanderings in the jungle.A very different figure from the usual trig one cut by the youngreporter.
"Oh, Billy, what has happened?" gasped Lathrop, shocked at hiscompanion's woe-begone appearance.
The reporter's reply was sufficiently alarming.
"Ben Stubbs has disappeared!"
"Disappeared?" echoed the amazed Lathrop.
"Yes, as utterly as if the earth had opened and swallowed him," was thereply, in a strained, tired voice. "I've hunted for him all theafternoon and I have not been able to find a trace of him. I got almostcut to ribbons in the sharp-leaved briars or whatever you call them."
He ruefully regarded his torn hands and ragged clothing.
"You are sure he is not merely hunting in another part of the island."
"Certain," was the dispiriting reply, "you see it happened like this--wehad shot a couple of turkeys when Ben suggested our separating andgetting a bigger bag in that way than we would by hunting together. Wewere to rejoin each other at the end of half an hour, the signal beingtwo shots. At the end of half an hour I fired two shots but there was noanswer. I tried again, and there was still no reply but the echo of myshots. I was scared then, I tell you, and fired the danger signal. Stillthere was no answer.
"Well, then, I was rattled. I plunged about in the woods till I got allripped up as you see and shouted for Ben till I thought my throat wouldcrack, but I didn't get a trace or a sign of him. Then I recovered mywits a bit and got out my compass. I headed for camp, and when I judgedI was near enough for you to hear me, I fired the danger signal--youanswered it, and here I am."
"Oh, Billy, what are we going to do?" exclaimed the younger boy.
"Make the best of it till we are certain Ben is lost, and thencommunicate with the _Tarantula_ and Frank and Harry," said thepractical Billy. "Cheer up, we don't know yet that any actual harm hasbefallen him, it's the mystery of the thing that worries me."
"I must send a wireless to Frank and Harry at once," cried Lathrop.
"You will do no such thing, young fellow," rejoined Billy. "In the firstplace they have got troubles enough of their own right now; and, in thesecond, a man is never lost till you've sent out a general alarm forhim, and he is still missing."
"A general alarm?" repeated Lathrop, puzzled.
"Yes, that's reporter's slang for advertising for a missing man. Well,we can't advertise here unless the herons and mocassins get out agazette, but we can take the canoes to-morrow and make a thoroughcircuit of the island."
Greatly comforted by Billy's assumed light-heartedness, Lathrop trampedback to camp by his side in a more cheerful frame of mind. As a matterof fact, Billy was feeling what he himself would have described as"pretty blue," but he was sensible enough to know that the best way toface the emergencies of life is to look at them from the best possibleaspect and not give up hope till every way out of difficulty has beentried.
In the meantime what had happened was this, and it was sufficientlyalarming. Ben, after he parted from Billy, had followed a fascinating"Ke-ouk ke-ouk" through the brush till he found himself near the marginof the creek that flowed round the island. He had reached the brink andwas looking inquiringly about him to ascertain what might have become ofthe big gobbler when he felt a rope thrown over his head from behind,and the next minute the big ex-sailor, great as was his strength, wasstruggling in the arms of a dozen men. Who his captors were he wasunable to see, for as the rope had tightened, his great arms werepinioned close to his side, forcing at the same time his gun from hisgrip, and a thick blanket had been thrown over his head. Blinded andhalf suffocated, Ben felt himself picked up and hustled through thewood. He tried to shout but the blanket effectually muffled his voice.
After a few minutes of this rapid traveling Ben felt himself thrown intowhat he instinctively realized was a canoe and then being paddledrapidly over the water. In what direction they were proceeding he had ofcourse no means of knowing, but from the few words his captors hadexchanged he knew he was in the hands of the Seminoles. Of the object ofhis abduction he could not even hazard a guess.
After about an hour of traveling Ben, through his smothering blanket,heard the loud barking of dogs and crying of children, and knew thatthey must be near a settlement of some kind. He was not left in doubt.The canoe's keel grated on the beach the next minute and he was draggedout and propelled toward the center of the sound. He felt dogs comesniffing about his legs and kicked out viciously. He grinned under hisblanket as he heard one limp away with ear-piercing howls.
"There's one trouble disposed of," thought Ben to himself, "what'scoming now. I wonder?"
He was not kept long in suspense. He was suddenly halted and the clothjerked off his head. His wrists, however, were not unbound. It was nowdark, and in the sudden glare of firelight that confronted him, Ben'seyes refused their duty for a minute or so. As he grew accustomed to thelight, however, and looked about him he saw that he stood in the centerof a rin
g of palmetto-thatched huts which were crowded with women andchildren, all heavily laden with beads--in fact these were about all theclothing the children wore--while all about him were grouped grave-facedmen with bright-colored turbans on their heads, one of whom he at oncerecognized as the chief who had visited them with Quatty the previousafternoon and promised them freedom from annoyance while they were inthe limits of the 'glades.
"This is a dern fine way you keep your promises," roared the captive Benindignantly, while the women snickered and the men regarded him withstolid curiosity, "you cigar-store Injuns you, if I had my hands freeI'd hammer you into lobscouse. I'd show you the kind of a buck sailormanI am. I thought you promised us you wouldn't disturb us and here youclap my head in a mainsail and furl me in it till I can't use mydeadlights to see day from night. Keelhaul you, if I had you aboard aship I'd masthead the lot of you till you fell overboard."
There was not a word in reply and the chief stood with folded arms, asimmobile as if Ben had not spoken a word.
"Oh, you're all going to play deaf, are you," bellowed the enragedex-sailorman, "well, it won't go down with me, my hearties. I know youcan hear,--oh, if only I had my hands free I'd put some life intoyou--you--you row of tenpins."
Here Ben stopped, because he was completely out of breath with hisvolcanic outburst. While he was getting ready for a fresh eruption, tohis surprise one of the younger men stepped forward from the solemncircle and in excellent English, considering the place and by whom itwas spoken, said:
"You all through big talk, white man?"
"All through," sputtered the amazed Ben, "yes, I'm through, that is forthe present. And now, as you seem to be the only one of this collectionof dummies that has any glimmering of sense, will you please tell me whyI am fetched here like a ship's cat going aboard a strange craft, alltied up in a bag?"
"No savee--ship's cat," replied the Seminole quietly; "plentee--savee,white man tell heap lie--all time."
"Calling me a liar, now are you, you mahogany-colored lobster," yelledBen, "I'd like to get one good punch at you, my matey."
"All white men liars," blandly went on the Indian, "steal our land--alltime break word to us--um no good."
"Well?" demanded Ben.
"Well," went on the spokesman of the tribe, "you stay here lillywhile--we no hurt you. When you fren's go then you go, too. They no hurtus we no hurt you."
"Oh, is that so?" replied Ben, "werry good of you, I'm sure."
"You eat plenty sofkee--plenty fowl--plenty tobac. Good time plenty,how?"
Now Ben had been in tight places in his adventurous career and he was byno means disposed to offend the Seminoles by seeming over anxious to getaway, at least for the present, for he knew that if he did so any chancethat his wrist gyves would be removed would be lost, so he acquiescedgracefully to all the Indian had said.
"All right, old odds-and-ends," he said, "I'll act as hostage as long asyou feed me well and give me plenty to smoke. Now, take off these."
As soon as his reply had been translated to the chief, and thatdignitary had agreed, the ropes that bound Ben's wrists were cut and hewas at comparative liberty.
"Sofkee?" questioned the young Indian who had conducted thenegotiations, indicating a huge pot simmering on the fire. And then forthe first time Ben tasted that delectable standby dish of the Seminoles,which is composed of birds, rabbits, turtles, fish, corn, potatoes,sweet and white, peppers, beans and anything else that comes to hand.There is a big kettle of it kept handy in every Seminole village andanyone who happens along is at liberty to help himself. There is onlyone drawback to the dish from fastidious folks' point of view, and thatis that every one helps him or herself from the same big wooden spoon.But Ben was not fastidious and he made a hearty meal of the savorycompound, and then after a pipe or two of tobacco, appeared to composehimself to sleep on a pile of skins laid on the floor of thepalmetto-thatched hut assigned to him.
He simulated slumber till midnight when, as no one appeared to bewatching, he rose and tiptoed out of the camp and down to the water'sedge where the canoes were moored. He was about to launch one when atall figure stepped out of the gloom of the trees and pointed a riflestraight at him.
"Huh--white man go back--or Injun shoot," said the figure.
Ben, as has been said, was a wise man--he went back.