CHAPTER XVII
HANK BUTTS DROPS SOMETHING
“FINE and swift!” chuckled the young skipper, though he had not muchfaith that the nervous one would remain up to pitch, “Don’t forget thatnew idea of yours, Mr. Moddridge.”
“I won’t,” promised the other, though his voice trembled a bit.
Under the young skipper’s orders Joe and Hank brought up the grapplinghooks and chains and made them fast in place at the starboard rail.
These chains, only a few feet long, ended in hooks that were intendedto catch in the rail of another vessel, holding the two craft lockedfast together.
“Bring me a wrench, and get one for Mr. Moddridge, too, Hank,” wasHalstead’s next order. “Also, get one for yourself. They’re handy, ifstrangers try to get rough with you.”
There Was a Roar of Pain From the Sailor.]
Young Butts quickly obeyed, though his own wrench he dropped into a hippocket. He came on deck bearing the same heavy hitching weight that hadbeen shied at the boat’s young skipper on the pier a few nights before.
“Like that better, do you?” asked Tom, his gaze lighting on it as Hanksprang on deck.
“Well, it might come handy,” replied the freckle-faced one,speculatively.
The three men left on the schooner had already hauled in their sheetsand headed around in the effort to reach their own boat’s crew. But the“Rocket” ran swiftly up alongside.
“You keep away from us!” yelled the man at the schooner’s wheel.
“Don’t you believe it for a minute,” Captain Tom retorted. Joe and Hankwere already at their stations with the grappling hooks.
“You’re acting like pirates, if you try to come aboard us,” shoutedback the fellow at the schooner’s wheel.
“A fine lot you are, to talk about piracy,” retorted Captain Halstead,ironically. Then, by a piece of neat steering, he ran the motor boat upso close alongside that she almost grazed the other vessel.
“Let go the hooks!” he ordered. Hank and Joe threw the grapplersso that both made fast over the schooner’s rail. In the same instantHalstead shut off power. The schooner, if it remained under sail, couldtow the “Rocket” now.
The instant that Joe Dawson and Hank Butts let go of the hooks theysprang to board the schooner. A sailor brandishing a belaying pin ranto intercept Hank, but that freckle-faced youth bounded to the sailingvessel’s deck, bearing the hitching weight before him in both hands.
Just as the sailor was about to close in with him Hank, almost as ifby accident, dropped the heavy iron weight. It fell, just where he hadintended it should, on the sailor’s advanced left foot.
There was a roar of pain as the sailor doubled up and sat down onthe deck. But Hank, who had sidestepped before the downward strokewith that belaying pin, now regained his weapon and straightened up,grinning.
“Sorry, matey,” observed Hank to the squatting sailor. “But didn’tyour father ever tell you that you oughtn’t to run into anyone who’scarrying too much weight for his age.”
Joe, a heavy wrench in one hand, and fire in both eyes, had leapedforward to meet the other sailor half-way. But that fellow, thougharmed with a length of stout rope, knotted at the end, prudentlyretreated, snarling all the while.
Tom Halstead was followed by Eben Moddridge as the young skipper madehis way aft to where the helmsman stood.
Hank, seeing that the sailor with the crushed foot was really out ofthe running, followed Halstead aft. Butts, holding his iron weight,perched himself on the cabin house, his feet dangling over the hatchway.
The helmsman had hastily made a few turns of rope fast around thewheel, to hold the vessel to its course. Now, his eyes glaring, hestepped in front of Halstead.
“What on airth d’ye mean by these pirate tactics?” he bellowed.
“Keep cool, and keep your distance,” ordered young Halstead, holdingthe wrench so that he could use it in a twinkling at need. “You have afriend of ours on board here. Where is he?”
“There ain’t no one on board ’cept you pirates and us three of thecrew,” retorted the late helmsman. “And you fellers ain’t going to beaboard but a few seconds more.”
“If you won’t help me out, I’ll go below and search the cabin,”proposed Captain Tom.
Just as the helmsman sprang forward to intercept this move Joe dartedbetween them, shoving the fellow back and threatening him with awrench. The sailor who had first moved to engage Dawson was nowstepping stealthily aft.
“Jorkins,” yelled the engaged helmsman, “don’t you let no one go downthat companionway. Stop it!”
“Ya-ah!” sneered Jorkins, sulkily. “With that feller balancing his tonof iron for a crack at my head?”
For Hank Butts had suddenly risen to a standing position on the cabinhouse roof, and was holding the hitching weight in a way that did notlook remarkably peaceful.
Halstead sprang down the companionway. Moddridge started to follow,then turned, feeling that he might be wanted on deck. In his presentexcitement he actually forgot to be nervous.
Below were two staterooms and a small saloon. Captain Tom quicklyexplored these rooms, searching also the lockers and cupboards. Just ashe was finishing he heard sounds of a tussle above, then a heavy fall.Like a flash the boy was on deck, fearing mischief. The troublesomehelmsman had made a spring at Dawson, only to be tripped by that agileyouth. Now Mr. Moddridge was seated on the helmsman’s chest, while HankButts had taken up a new post from which he could drop the weight, atneed, upon the helmsman’s legs. The latter fellow, therefore, was nowkeeping quiet. Turning, Joe, wrench in readiness, had driven the otheruninjured seaman forward. The fellow whom Hank had first encounteredwas limping about, though he did not look likely to cause any trouble.
One swift glance Halstead shot out over the water, at that small boat,still more than half a mile distant. Then the “Rocket’s” young skipperran forward, looking in at forecastle and galley. He even looked downinto the water butts, but no Mr. Delavan was to be found.
“I am afraid we’ve boarded the wrong ship,” declared Mr. Moddridge,hesitatingly.
“Ye’ll find out ye have, afore ye’re through with the law,” growledthe prostrate and now prudent helmsman, from his “bed” on the deck.“Boarding a craft forcibly, on the high seas, is a crime.”
“Aw, be a good well, and run dry,” advised Hank.
There remained, now, only the holds to be investigated. Oppressed bythe shortness of the time that was left to him, and fearing, also, thathis guess had not been a good one, Tom Halstead sprang down the ladderinto the forward hold. Here there was nothing beyond a miscellaneouscargo of supplies. The after hold was empty. With a white face Halsteadreached the deck.
Here the young skipper beheld Joe and the seaman whom his chum washolding at bay.
“See here, my man,” Tom uttered hastily, turning to the sailor, “tellme just where to find the man that’s a prisoner on board, and, onbehalf of Mr. Moddridge, I’ll offer you five hundred dollars in cashand a safe passage ashore on our boat.”
“There ain’t no one on this boat a prisoner, unless it’s us fellers ofthe crew,” returned the sailor, sulkily.
Yet, as he spoke, there was a cunning gleam in his eyes that madeHalstead believe him to be lying.
“By gracious, there’s one place I overlooked,” ejaculated CaptainHalstead, turning from the seaman and heading again for the holdladder. Down he went, as fast as he could travel. With the wrench hetapped along the floor.
“Oho! It’s hollow here,” muttered the young skipper, halting in themiddle of the fore hold, right over the keel. His keen eyes moved fastas he looked for some indication of unfastened planking. Finding onecrack that looked suspicious, he pried in an edge of the wrench. Theplank yielded, came up in Tom’s nervous, ready, strong fingers, and——
There lay Francis Delavan!
“Good gracious! What have they done to him?” gasped the young motorboat skipper.
The Wall Street man lay on hi
s back, his arms under him, as though tiedbehind him.
The plank he was holding fell to one side as Tom Halstead’s firstglimpse of his employer revealed that much.
There was a gag in Mr. Delavan’s mouth, but the startling signs werethe purplish blue in his face and the queer, lifeless look in hispartly-open eyes.
“Have they killed him? Is it spite work, or all part of their fearfulplot?” shuddered Tom Halstead.
Then, his heart pounding against his ribs at a fearful rate, the boybent down to rest an inquiring hand on that unnatural-looking face.