Spencer Davenport - The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - or, The Missing Chest of Gold

“Say, boys, it looks like a storm and a heavy one, too.”

The jest and laughter ceased at once, and three pairs of eyes looked in the direction pointed out by the speaker.

“See that big bank of cloud climbing up the sky?” continued Fred Rushton. “There’s more than a capful of wind in that, if I know anything about weather.”

“You’re right, Fred,” said Lester Lee, who was handling the tiller. “And we’re a long way off from home! It’s up to us to turn about and make a run for it.”

“Oh, I don’t think it will amount to anything,” said Teddy Rushton, Fred’s younger brother, who was never averse to taking a chance. “We’re having such a grand time that I hate to make a break for land unless we have to. Besides, I’ve never been out in a squall, and I’d like to have the experience.”

“You’d have more experience than you cared for with this blow that is coming,” returned the helmsman, and there was a growing anxiety in his tone. “I’m more familiar with this coast than you are, and I’d rather look at the storm from the shore than from the deck of this catboat. So, here’s for a quick scoot for home,” he concluded, as he brought the boat around and laid the course for the shore.

It was a staunch little sailboat of twenty-two feet in length, and the way she minded her helm, as well as the ease with which she rode the waves, spoke eloquently of her qualities.

On this afternoon, off the coast of Maine, she held a jolly party of four boys. Lester Lee, who owned the boat and managed the tiller, was the host, and his guests were Bill Garwood and Fred and Teddy Rushton, all of them fellow schoolmates of Lester’s at Rally Hall. It was vacation time, and the boys were gloating over the fact that they were going to have several weeks more than usual before school opened in the fall. The news had come in a letter that Fred had received that morning from Melvin Granger, one of his last year’s chums.

“Good for old Mel!” exulted Teddy. “He knew how good we’d feel about it, and he couldn’t get the news to us quickly enough.”

“That stroke of lightning knew its business when it struck the right wing of the building,” laughed Fred. “Mel says that several of the rooms were burned out, and it will be fully a month after the usual time before everything can be got in running order.”

“I’ll bet old Hardtack is raving, because he can’t get us under his thumb as soon as he expected,” grinned Bill, referring in this irreverent fashion to Dr. Hardach Rally, head of Rally Hall.

“It’s lucky the lightning didn’t hit the gymnasium, anyway,” commented Lester. “We’ll have some tough teams to tackle this coming year and we’ll need all the practice we can get. Ease her off a little, Fred,” he added, to the older Rushton boy, who was handling the sheet.

Fred did so, just in time to avoid the full force of a big wave that was coming on the port side. But enough of it came aboard to drench thoroughly Teddy and Bill, who were lounging at the foot of the mast.

“Wow!” yelled Teddy, as he scrambled to his feet. “That was a corker. I got a gallon down my back that time.”

“Gallon?” echoed Bill. “It seemed to me more like a hogshead. I’m as wet as a drowned rat.”

“Don’t you care, fellows,” called out Lester. “We won’t any of us have a dry stitch on by the time we get to land.”

“You don’t suppose there’s any danger, do you?” asked Bill, who at his father’s ranch would have been perfectly at home on the back of a bucking broncho, but here on the sea felt out of his element.

“Oh, no,” replied Lester, carelessly. “That is,” he hastened to add, “there’s always more or less danger when one’s out in an open boat in a storm. But this Ariel of mine is a jim dandy, and I don’t think we’ll have any trouble. Even if she should go over, we could hang on to the bottom, and there are so many boats in these waters that we’d soon be picked up.”

Despite his careless air and confident words, it was evident from the way he scanned the sky and the tumbling waste of waters that he was secretly uneasy.

The sky had by this time become completely overcast, and although it was only mid afternoon, it was as dark as though twilight were coming on. The wind came in stronger gusts, and the waves broke ever more threateningly against the side of the boat. The land was blotted out, and only the tossing waters met the view in every direction.

“I ought to have turned around sooner,” Lester muttered to himself, “but I was so interested in the letter that Fred got from Mel I didn’t notice those storm clouds coming up.”

The conversation had ceased. Lester had all he could do to handle the tiller and shape his course, and Fred had to be on the alert in his management of the sheet, which strained and tugged under the force of the wind. It was a time for action rather than speech, and Bill and Teddy, who just then could do nothing but serve as ballast, looked on in silence as the Ariel tore through the waves.

Suddenly an object that appeared on the starboard side excited Teddy so much that a cry broke from his lips.

“Look at that big fish over there!” he exclaimed. “It’s a monster. What is it, a porpoise?”

“Porpoise nothing,” said Lester briefly, letting his eye wander a moment from the tiller. “That’s a shark.”

“A shark!” was the cry that broke at the same time from Teddy and Bill, neither of whom had even seen that “pirate of the sea,” and they felt a shivery thrill from the sudden discovery.

“Yes,” answered Lester, “and from the size of the fin, he must be a whopper. We seldom see them so large in these waters.”

“Is he a man-eater, do you think?” asked Bill in an awed whisper.

“That depends,” answered Lester. “If he’s a blue shark or a hammerhead, he probably is. They pulled one out about fifty miles from here last year, and when they cut him up, they found a man’s boot in his stomach. They’re good things to keep away from.”

“I should say they were,” agreed Bill. “I’d rather take my chance with a rattlesnake.”

Again they lapsed into silence, but their eyes never left that ominous fin that showed just above the water, cutting it like a knife.

There was a quick exclamation from Lester, and looking at him, they saw that he was peering at an object perhaps half a mile away. It was large and vague in the gathering darkness, but Bill’s keen eyes, accustomed to gaze over wide spaces in the West, made it out at once.

“It’s a motor boat!” he exclaimed. “And by jinks! it seems to be in trouble. See how it tosses about. It looks as if it would upset any minute.”

“Those motor boats are always unsafe,” remarked Lester, with the scorn that the master of a sailboat usually feels for any craft driven by machinery. “They’re getting out of order all the time, and a fellow takes his life in his hands every time he goes out in one. For my part give me a sailboat.”

“Can you see how many people are on board of her?” asked Fred anxiously.

“I see only one,” replied Bill, “and he seems to be tinkering with the engine. Wow! but she shipped a lot of water just then.”

“What are we going to do?” asked Teddy. “He may get upset, and if he doesn’t know how to swim, he’ll drown. And even if he were a good swimmer, he couldn’t make the shore in a storm like this.”

“Here’s the answer,” said Lester briefly, as he gave the tiller a twist and gave Fred directions to pull in the sheet. In a moment the boat had changed its course and was bearing down swiftly toward the disabled craft.