with the _Eagle_.

He had never been so aroused about anything before in all his life. The
adventure that Henry Burns and the others had had with the two men that
had been caught was an experience after his own heart. He would have
given his whole summer’s fun to take part in that capture. But all the
glory of that had been denied him; now he made a resolve that if any one
succeeded in finding the vanished yacht it should be he.

His activity was not destined to go all for naught, either, for on at
least one occasion he was satisfied in his own mind that he had met with
the yacht,—yes, and nearly come to close quarters with the man that
sailed it.

It was miles below Grand Island, for Harvey had for some days made up his
mind that the man he sought had left the bay, since he had scoured it
east and west and north and south in vain. It was down among some islands
that lay out of the much travelled part of the bay, and not far from the
Gull Island Thoroughfare. It was, in fact, just at the outer rim of the
bay, where several channels through a chain of islands led out to sea.
There were three of the crew aboard besides Harvey, only little Tim being
left ashore to guard the camp.

They had been cruising all evening among these islands, for it was a part
of the coast with which Harvey was very familiar. They were carrying no
lights, for the chances of being run down here were small, and, besides,
it was a part of Harvey’s plan to be able to approach any chance craft
unobserved.

It had come on rainy, and the crew were for putting in at some harbour
and lying snug, but Harvey would not hear of it. He had sailed until near
midnight for about a week, and did not like to give it up.

However, as a concession to his crew, and as it bade fair to blow up a
nasty sea before many hours, Harvey had consented to beat back and forth
under the lee of a small unnamed island, keeping a lookout down the bay
for the little distance they could see through the rain.

It seemed that some other craft was also willing to take the risk of
sailing without lights, for, along about ten o’clock, a yacht, that might
or might not be the one for which they sought, was beating up toward the
island, with all dark on board. All at once the man that sat at the wheel
left his boat for a moment to itself, so that it headed up into the wind
with sails flapping, while he darted down into the cabin.

He was gone only for a moment, but in that brief moment that he was below
a light flashed in the cabin,—only a fleeting gleam of light, and then
all was dark again.

This gleam of light, transient as it was, had sufficed, however, for the
sharp lookout aboard the _Surprise_.

Harvey seized Joe Hinman by the shoulder and whispered, as he steered the
_Surprise_ out from behind the end of the island: “Did you see that, Joe?
Did you see it? There’s something coming up. Everybody keep quiet now!”

There was an excited group that crouched silently in the cockpit of the
_Surprise_ as she swung out from under the lee of the island and headed
straight for the spot where they had seen the flash of light, running
almost before the wind.

Whatever the craft was, it seemed as if they must surely catch it,
leaping out as they had from the darkness. All at once they saw the dark
outline of a yacht almost dead ahead, and saw for a moment the shadow of
its sails, a faint blur through the rain.

Then the yacht veered about suddenly, and they saw the white crush of
water as it heeled over, and, running with the wind on its quarter, was
gone, like a boat that had vanished. So sudden and so silent was the
manœuvre that they could hardly realize that the yacht had, indeed,
turned like a flash and run away. They followed for a moment, but, seeing
how useless it was, Harvey soon gave up the chase and went back to
harbour, beaten but not discouraged.

“That was the man we want,” he said, as they came to in the nearest
harbour that night. “No other craft would have gone off its course that
way. And to think we were almost upon him.”

“Yes, but I don’t see what good it would have done us to have come up
with him, if it was the man,” replied Allan Harding. “We could only have
taken a look aboard. What else could we have done?”

“I’ll tell you what,” answered Harvey, emphatically. “It would have done
a lot of good. I tell you that wherever and whenever I meet that yacht,
whether it’s night or day, I’m going to run alongside, and you fellows
and I are going aboard. I’ve been doing things to be ashamed of long
enough,—not that I’m ashamed of them, either, as I know of. Only they
have been things that I didn’t dare tell of afterward, and I’m sort of
tired of it. I tell you, I want to do something for once that I can boast
of and that people won’t hate me for. That’s why I’m so anxious about
this, if you must know it.”

“Whew!” cried Joe Hinman. “That’s something new for you, Jack. I didn’t
suppose your conscience ever troubled you.”

“It don’t,” said Harvey, angrily.

But perhaps it did.

By the end of a few days more, Harvey had given up the search, convinced
that they had seen the last of the black yacht, if, indeed, they had seen
it at all.

“I give up,” he said. “I’m beaten, and that’s all there is to it.”

And so the idea of ever seeing the strange yacht again was given up by
all. The yachts came back to harbour, and the impression became general
that they had all been fooled; that what they had sought was a delusion.

Tom and Bob were the last to give up. Partly because they liked these
long paddles together and the long walks along the island roads, and
partly because they had helped start the renewed hunt for the yacht
_Eagle_, and did not like to admit that they had made a mistake.

So they did not wholly discontinue their evening paddles nor their lonely
rambles along the shore. It was good exercise, at all events, they
argued.

One evening they started right after supper, while it was yet light,
paddled down along the shore to the Narrows, carried across, and paddled
down the island for some three miles. Then they landed and hid their
canoe, as was their custom, and stretched themselves out on the beach to
rest and enjoy the lights far out on the water.

It was a clear starlight night, with the bay still and restful, save for
a quick gust of wind that came now and then, only to blur its surface for
a moment and leave it smooth again.

“I guess we have tried this thing about often enough, haven’t we, Bob?”
asked Tom, finally. “We don’t seem to be a success as man-hunters.”

“I’m about ready to quit,” answered Bob, yawning and stretching. “The
fact is, we really get enough exercise through the day. Here we’ve been
swimming, bicycling, helping the Warrens get up driftwood, paddled over
to the cape, all in one day,—and here we are at it again at night. Yes, I
think it’s time we gave this up.”

“Then supposing we do call it off,” said Tom. “I’ve had paddling enough
for one day. What do you say to going up along the beach for a mile or
two, and then taking the shortest cut home and coming down for the canoe
to-morrow? I think I’m kind of tired, myself, though I didn’t notice it
when we started out.”

“All right, that suits me,” replied Bob. “I don’t mind saying that I’m a
bit tired, too. That last mile came hard, and no mistake.”

So they rose and sauntered along the beach toward the Narrows, till they
had come to within about half a mile of it, and then sat down once more
for a brief rest before going home.

“It seems almost too bad to go home to bed such a beautiful night as
this,” said Bob. “These are the kind of nights that make me wish we had
the old tent back again, so we could lie on our bunks and look out on the
water, as we used to do before we went to sleep.”

The night was indeed singularly calm and peaceful. The bay was still, and
the water as it came up the beach with the tide made only a small
rustling, creeping sound, as it covered the sand inch by inch. As for the
island, it always seemed asleep after nightfall, and to-night there was
scarcely a sound of life anywhere to break the stillness.

But then, all at once, as they sat there looking out upon the water, out
of the silence there arose a cry, faint and smothered, but a cry for
help.

Then all was still again.

They sprang to their feet, startled, almost frightened for a brief moment
at the strange cry, coming from they knew not where.

Again the cry came, this time more distinctly, from somewhere out on the
water. They heard the words, “Help! Help!” uttered in a choking voice, as
of a man drowning.

The boys rushed down to the water’s edge and peered out over the bay,
straining their eyes to see whence the sound came.

“Hulloa! Hulloa! Where are you? What’s the matter? Call again!” cried
Tom.

They listened, and in a moment the voice came again weirdly over the
water, though they could not distinguish this time the words.

“Why, there it is,” cried Bob, all at once, pointing as he spoke. “Don’t
you see it, Tom? I declare, but it’s queer we didn’t see it before. Look,
there’s something floating only about an eighth of a mile out,—and
there’s something moving a little distance from it. Why, Tom, I’ll tell
you what it is. It’s a canoe—it’s Jack Harvey—and he’s upset—he’s
drowning. Just look, where I am pointing.”

“Yes, I see,” exclaimed Tom, excitedly. “I just saw a splash. He’s upset,
sure enough, and struggling. I say, Bob, we’ve got to swim out. Our canoe
is too far. Keep up! We’re coming!” he called, and began hurriedly to
strip off his clothing.

In a moment the two boys were in the water, striking out wildly toward
the object that seemed to be a canoe floating in the water.

“Hold on there, Bob,” cried Tom, presently. “We mustn’t try to be too
fast. We’ll only waste our strength. We’ll need it all when we get there.
Let’s calm down, now, and not get excited. We’ve got to keep our heads.”

Then, as they surged ahead, with long, powerful strokes, the voice again
came, calling chokingly for help. There could be no mistaking it now. It
was Jack Harvey.

“Quick!” he cried, “quick! I can’t hold on long. I’m hurt.”

They quickened their strokes, and in a moment more came in plain sight of
Harvey, struggling feebly to keep above water.

“Hold on for a moment, Jack,” said Tom, as they came up to him. “Don’t
grab us, now. Let us do the work. You just keep on paddling, what you
can, and we’ll save you.”

“I won’t grab you,” gasped Harvey. “Just get on each side of me and let
me put my hands on your shoulders for a moment, till I get my strength
back. I’ve swallowed a lot of water.”

The two swam up close, and Harvey reached up and rested a hand on each
shoulder.

“Swim for the canoe now,” said Tom. “We’ll let him get hold of the end of
that and cling on for a few moments till he gets his breath. He’ll be all
right, I think.”

Reaching the overturned canoe, they helped him to clasp one end of it,
and then supported him there, as they began to push it toward shore by
swimming with their feet and with a single hand each.

For a few moments Harvey managed to hold on, but then his strength seemed
to fail him and his hands slipped their hold.

“I can’t hold on,” he gasped. “Something’s hurting me.”

“Then lie over on your back and float,” said Tom. “Just lie still and
we’ll swim you in.”

Harvey groaned at the effort it cost him, but did as he was told, and
they left the canoe and struck out with him for the shore.

It was not such a long swim that they had before them, but they had
exhausted their strength more than they knew in their excitement, and
Harvey was well-nigh helpless.

Before they had swum a rod farther, their breath began to come hard and
their shoulders ached until it seemed as though they would crack.

Still they kept on.

“We’ll make it all right, Tom?” said Bob, finally, panting the words out.

“We’ve got to,” said Tom. “We’re bound to do it. Let’s swim on our backs
for a spell. Jack, we’re going to change the stroke. Don’t get scared.
We’re going to stick by you.”

The words seemed to rouse Harvey, who had apparently almost lost
consciousness.

“Let me go,” he gasped, faintly. “Let me go, I say. I don’t want you
fellows to drown, too. Let me——”

And then he seemed suddenly to lose control of himself, and clutched
frantically at them, with the frenzy of a drowning man.

They struck themselves loose from him, and he sank under water, but came
to the surface again, exhausted and helpless. Tom seized him then by the
hair. He lay motionless, as though dead, and they took hold once more and
struck out again for the shore.

When they had reached it—they scarcely knew how—and felt the sand again
under their feet, they had barely strength enough to drag Harvey a little
ways out of the water, and lay by his side on the beach, groaning with
every breath they drew.

This was from sheer exhaustion, caused by exerting themselves far beyond
their natural strength. They were not strangled with swallowing water, so
that after they had lain there flat on the beach for some five minutes
they had regained their strength sufficiently to be able to arise and
lift the half-unconscious Harvey completely out of the water and carry
him up on the bank. Then they sat down and rested once more, sitting by
Harvey’s side and chafing his hands. They lifted him up, although the
effort cost them all their strength, held him head downwards for a moment
to get the water out of him, then doubled his arms upon his breast and
extended them, over and over again, alternately, as they had learned was
the way to restore a man rescued from drowning.

Harvey, who had never fully lost consciousness, revived under their
treatment, till at length they perceived that he was out of danger, and
needed now as quickly as possible warmth and shelter.

There was no house near by, and it was clear that whatever was done for
Harvey must be done by them.

“We can’t carry him, that’s certain,” said Bob, finally. “We’ve got to
get our canoe and paddle him up as far as the Narrows in that. Then we
can get his crew over, and we can all carry him up to their camp.”

So Bob set out on a weary trot down along the shore to where they had
hidden their canoe. Tom waited by Harvey, trying to keep him warm, or,
rather, to restore warmth to him, by rubbing; but Harvey was chilled
through and through and shivered pitifully. It was fully an hour, and
seemed ten to Tom, before Bob appeared in sight again.

They lifted Harvey into the canoe and set out for the Narrows. Poor Bob
was well-nigh exhausted, and it was Tom who did about all the paddling.
They reached the Narrows, however, after what seemed an endless journey,
driving their paddles through the water with arms that almost refused to
obey the wills that forced them to work.

When they had reached the Narrows, Tom set out for Harvey’s camp, leaving
Bob to wait with Harvey. Tom had not gone more than half a mile, however,
when he ran into the entire crew, who had become alarmed at Harvey’s long
absence, knowing that he had gone out in the canoe, and had started out
in search of him.

Tom’s white face, pallid with weariness, filled them with terror, as he
rushed up to them and sank down on a knoll, breathless.

“Why, it’s Tom Harris,” exclaimed Joe Hinman. “For Heaven’s sake, what is
it? Did you see Jack? Is he drowned?”

He rattled off the questions excitedly, before Tom could find breath to
answer.

“He’s all right, I guess,” Tom said, in a moment. “He isn’t drowned. He’s
over there the other side of the Narrows; Bob’s with him. He is most dead
with cold, though. You better get him over to camp quick or he will die.”

They were off like mad, on the run for the Narrows, before he had
finished.

Tom waited to rest a few moments more, and then set off slowly for
Harvey’s camp. “There’s enough of them to bring him,” he said. “I guess
Bob and I have done about all we can to-night.”

When he had reached Harvey’s camp, however, he waited only to rest and
warm himself by the brands of a fire which the campers had left, before
he began to make what preparations he could to receive the boys when they
should return with Harvey.

There was a big pile of wood at hand, and he started the fire up afresh,
after having first pushed the brands nearer the tent, so that the fire
would send a comforting warmth inside. Then he brought out a pair of
blankets and put them near the fire to warm through. He hung a kettle of
water on the stick provided for it, and rummaged through the campers’
stock for the coffee.

Presently the sound of voices told him that the crew were at hand.
Stepping to the door of the tent, he saw the strange group approaching.
They had not taken Harvey from the canoe, but had let him lie there,
while they lifted the canoe and carried it along, two boys at either end,
bearing the weight with a stick stretched underneath to support it.
Alongside plodded Bob, holding to the gunwale, to assist in steadying it.
They approached and set the canoe down, just outside the tent door.

“Get his clothes off quick, now,” cried Tom. “I have the hot blankets
ready to wrap him in, and some coffee when he is able to take it.”

In a twinkling Harvey was stripped and rolled snugly in the blankets,
while Tom busied himself in rushing up with cloths heated hot, and
applying them to the soles of his feet. After a time he lifted Harvey up
and poured a few spoonfuls of the coffee down his throat. This seemed to
revive Harvey, for he opened his eyes, muttered something that was
unintelligible, and sank back to sleep.

“He’s all right now,” said Tom, passing his hand over Harvey. “He is
getting warm again. He’ll be all right now when he gets his sleep out.”

Tom and Bob were thoroughly tired. They lay stretched out before the fire
on blankets for a time, too weary to more than barely reply to the
questions of the crew as to the mishap that had befallen Harvey.

Presently Tom rose up and said: “Well, Bob, it’s late, and we’ve got to
be getting started or we’ll never get back to the cottage.”

“We shall be down again to-morrow to see how Harvey is,” he added,
turning to the crew, who sat a little apart, somewhat abashed by the turn
of affairs and the consciousness of the debt of gratitude they now owed
to the boys whom they had wronged. “We’ll send a doctor down if you want
us to, but I don’t think there’s any need of it. He’ll be all right by
morning. Good night.”

They were about taking their departure when Harvey struggled for a moment
with the clothing that enveloped him, lifted his head slightly from the
ground, and said, weakly, “Hold on.”

“What is it?” asked Tom, as they stepped inside the tent again and sat
down beside him.

“Don’t go,” said Harvey, huskily. “Please don’t go. I want you to stay
here to-night,—that is, if you will. I’ve—I’ve got something—something to
say to you in the morning. I can’t say it now. I’m too weak. But I want
the crew to hear it in the morning.”

Tom and Bob looked at each other in astonishment. Then they nodded, and
Tom replied to Harvey:

“All right, Jack. We’ll stay. Go to sleep now. You’re all right.”

The crew quickly spread some boughs for them, and brought more blankets
from the yacht.

“Tom,” said Bob, as they stood alone for a moment, while the crew were
busily engaged, “it looks like our revenge.”

And then, before they had the blankets half-wrapped about them, they were
sinking off to sleep,—to sleep in Harvey’s camp, alongside Harvey’s crew.

                              CHAPTER XVI.
                         A TREATY OF FRIENDSHIP

It was late the following morning when Tom and Bob awoke. The sun was
well up, and the light was streaming into the tent. Their eyes opened on
unfamiliar objects and on strange surroundings.

“It gave me the strangest feeling,” said Tom, telling Henry Burns about
it some time later. “At first, before I was fully awake, I had forgotten
where I was, and I thought I was back in our own tent upon the point.
Then it flashed over me that that was gone, and the next moment I
remembered that I was down there in Harvey’s camp, and you can’t imagine
what a queer feeling it gave me.”

Harvey and the crew had already arisen, and Tom and Bob could hear the
crackling of a fire outside, where they were preparing breakfast. Harvey
had awakened apparently as strong as ever, unharmed by his terrible
experience of the night before.

“Hello, Bob,” said Tom, as they looked across the tent at each other. “Do
you know where you are? Isn’t this a queer scrape? I wonder what will
come of it.”

“Hello,” answered Bob, yawning and stretching. “Oh, but how I did sleep.
I feel as though I had slept about a week. I never was so tired in my
life. Say, this is queer, isn’t it? Who’d ever have thought we would be
sleeping here, of all places.”

They arose and stepped outside.

The crew paused in their work and looked up, while Harvey advanced to
meet his guests.

“Hello,” he said. “We thought we’d let you have your sleep out. You must
have been played out.”

“Hello,” answered Tom and Bob. “We thought you were far worse off than
we,” continued Bob, “but you seem to have come out of it all right.”

Harvey had by this time come up to them. He paused, hesitatingly, for a
moment, while his face flushed. Then he put out his hand.

“Will you shake hands with me?” he asked.

Tom and Bob, for answer, extended each his right hand and grasped that of
Harvey.

“Thank you,” said Harvey, simply. “I don’t deserve it, I know.”

There may have been the faintest suspicion of moisture about his eyes.

“Come over here,” he said, and led the way to a big log that lay near the
fire, close by where the crew now stood. “I want to say something to you,
and so do the fellows, too.”

There was an embarrassing moment as Tom and Bob seated themselves on the
log, while the crew stood awkwardly by. They seemed uncertain what to do
or say to these brave young fellows, whom they now knew had risked their
lives to save their leader. With boy-like reticence, they were too
ashamed to speak. Harvey broke the silence.

“The fellows and I don’t know hardly what to say to you,” he said. “The
crew want to tell you how ashamed we all are for the way we have treated
you, and they want to thank you for what you did for me; but they can’t
begin to tell what they feel,—and no more can I,—but they want me to
speak for them, too, as I’ve been their captain in all we’ve done, as
well as aboard the yacht.

“They know what you did for me,” continued Harvey. “I told them the whole
story this morning. There never was anything braver than what you did,
and they all know it now as well as I do. They know you were as near
drowning as I was, at the last, and you wouldn’t give up and let me go,
but stuck to me till the end, and couldn’t have saved your own lives if
there had been another rod to go.

“I wouldn’t be here now, if it wasn’t for you—”

“Well, you would have done the same for us, and so would the crew,” said
Tom, eager to spare the other’s mortification as much as possible, and
feeling his heart kindling toward his late enemy.

“I don’t know whether I should or not,” replied Harvey. “I don’t think
I’m so much of a coward, even if I _have_ been doing things that look
that way. But that doesn’t make our position any the better. It isn’t
what we would have done for you in the same danger that counts. It’s what
we have been doing to you ever since you landed on the island that makes
our case so bad.”

“I tell you,” Harvey exclaimed, vehemently, as he arose from the log,
“we’ve been a lot of fools and we’ve been thinking all the time that we
were smart. It just came to me like a flash, as I thought I was going
down out there, all the mean things I’ve been doing and what a fool I’ve
been. I knew it all the time, too, I guess, only I didn’t care. But you
fellows have just brought it home to us hard, and we are going to try to
square things up all that we can.

“Now, first,” continued Harvey, taking a long breath and speaking
earnestly, “we’re sorry we stole that box of yours from off the wharf. We
knew it was yours all the time, too, though I said we didn’t. Of course
we couldn’t help knowing. We don’t blame you, either, for blowing up the
cave—”

“We didn’t intend really to blow it up,” interrupted Tom. “That was my
idea, to burn up some of the stuff, just to get even, and we were nearly
scared to death when the explosion came off. We thought you were all
killed.”

“Well, I believe you now,” said Harvey, “although I didn’t before. I can
see just how it happened, too. The fact is, we had some powder and
kerosene there, hidden away. That’s what caused it. Well, anyway, we
don’t blame you for setting the fire, and we shouldn’t blame you now, if
you had meant to blow up the cave, too. We deserved it.”

“We’re sorry it happened, anyway,” said Bob.

“Now,” added Harvey, “there’s another thing, and that’s the tent. Of
course you knew we took it, although you couldn’t prove it. You hadn’t
any doubt about it, had you?”

“Well,” replied Tom, “we did kind of think so, although we couldn’t be
sure.”

“Of course you thought so,” said Harvey, “because nobody else would have
done it. However, you are going to get the tent back all right.”

“Hooray!” cried Bob.

“You’re not half so glad as I am,” exclaimed Harvey. “You bet I’m glad we
didn’t harm it. It’s safe and sound, and you wouldn’t guess where it is
in a hundred years. It’s up in the old haunted house, stuffed away in the
garret, under the eaves. We didn’t dare keep it and we didn’t want to
destroy it. In fact, we had decided to put it back on the point some day,
after we had kept it as long as we wanted to.”

“We’ll set it up again this afternoon,” cried Tom.

“No, you won’t,” answered Harvey, quickly. “We’re going to do that for
you, that is, if you will let us. We want to put it up in as good shape
as it was before. We’ll feel better about it then, eh, fellows?”

“That’s right,” responded Joe Hinman. And the others nodded assent.

“Now, one thing more,” said Harvey. “You saw what we had in the cave.
There were some things that belonged to Spencer, and one of the first
things I do to-day will be to go up there and settle up with him. Then
I’ll feel as though I was ready to start fair again.

“And now if you fellows will sit down and have some breakfast with us,
then we’ll sail up right after it and get the tent and have it up for you
just as quick as we can. We can’t do it any too quick to suit us.”

So Tom and Bob seated themselves with their new-found friends. George
Baker, who had the fry-pan all heated and a big dish of batter mixed,
proceeded to fry a mess of flapjacks, while Joe Hinman poured the coffee.
All the old enmity had vanished in a night, and they laughed and joked as
they sat about the campfire like friends of long standing.

Then, when they had finished, and had shaken hands once more all around,
and Tom and Bob had departed for the Warren cottage to explain their
strange absence, and to acquaint the Warrens with the new turn of
affairs, Harvey and his crew got sail on the _Surprise_ and headed up
alongshore for the haunted house.

“There,” cried George Warren, as the boys appeared in sight a little
later, “didn’t I tell you, mother, not to worry about Tom and Bob? You
ought to know them by this time. They know how to take care of
themselves.”

“Well, the next time you go off for all night,” exclaimed Mrs. Warren, a
little impatiently for her, “I wish you would let me know about it
beforehand. I don’t like to have to worry about you, and I can’t help it
if you start off in that canoe and don’t come back.”

“I don’t blame you for not liking it,” replied Tom, “and we’ll try not do
it again. But we really couldn’t help this. We met with an adventure.”

“What, you didn’t see the _Eagle_, did you?” cried George Warren.

“No, you’re wide of the mark,” laughed Tom. “We’ve given up that hunt for
good. No, we had a different sort of an adventure altogether. Where do
you suppose we slept last night?”

“With Henry Burns,” said young Joe.

“No.”

“Down on the beach?” said Arthur.

“No.”

“Give it up,” said George.

“Well, you wouldn’t guess in a hundred times trying,” said Tom, “so I’ll
tell you. It was in Jack Harvey’s camp.”

“Harvey’s camp!” exclaimed the three brothers, in chorus.

“Yes, sir, Harvey’s camp.”

“I didn’t know they were off on a cruise,” said George. “Oh, I see,
you’ve been getting even, have you? And how about the camp? Is it still
there? What have you done with that?”

“It’s still down there,” laughed Tom. “We didn’t do anything to it at
all. In fact, the crew were all there, and Harvey, too. We stayed there
because they invited us. And, what’s more, we have just had breakfast
with them all.”

The Warrens stared at Tom in amazement.

“Had breakfast with Harvey and his crew! Oh, say, you fellows, quit
fooling now, and tell us where you have been.”

“Well,” said Tom, “listen and we’ll tell you the whole story. We’ve been
having our revenge.”

And Tom related the story of the night’s adventures.

Good Mrs. Warren fairly hugged them with delight when they had concluded.

“That’s just splendid,” she cried. “That’s a splendid revenge. That’s the
kind that counts for most. But I want to hear Jack Harvey tell the story
now. I know you haven’t told half about the rescue. I want to hear him
tell how brave you were.”

“He’ll exaggerate it,” said Bob. “He’s our friend, you know, now.”

“Well, I’m glad enough you are all friends,” exclaimed Mrs. Warren. “You
must go and tell Henry Burns.”

When Jack Harvey and his crew had returned from the haunted house, and
had anchored off the point and had brought the tent ashore, they found
assembled there to greet them the entire group of comrades, the Warren
boys, Henry Burns, and Tom and Bob.

There was a general hand-shaking all around, and then they all set to
work to pitch the tent. It didn’t take long to do it, either, for Tom and
Bob had saved the poles that had supported the canvas, and there were
hands enough to jump at every rope and bring it taut into place. And
everybody went at it in such good spirit, and everybody was so pleased
and so willing to lend a hand, that the tent was up in its old place
again almost as quick as it had come down.

Then they rushed off in high spirits to the Warren cottage for the
camp-kit and the boxes and the blankets and all the camp equipment, and
packed it down on their shoulders as fast as they had ever done anything
in all their lives.

And Mrs. Warren did hear the story of the rescue from Jack Harvey’s own
lips, and was prouder than ever of her boys’ friends, Tom and Bob.

Then, when everything was shipshape, and Harvey and his crew were about
to take their departure, he said: “We want all you fellows to come down
to-morrow evening and take supper with us, the whole of you. You see,
I’ve just got my allowance from the governor, and he’s mighty generous to
me, more than I deserve. It comes in just at the right time. You’ll be
sure and come, all of you?”

“We’ll be there,” answered Henry Burns.

“Indeed we will,” said young Joe.

“And remember Joe counts for two when it comes to the supper-table,” said
George.

“We’ll have enough,” said Harvey.

“We’ll go along with you to your camp,” said Tom, “and get our canoe.
That is, unless you’d like to use it awhile,” he added, slyly.

“Not much,” replied Harvey, with a laugh. “I’ve had enough canoeing to
last me for a few days. But I’m glad I took that paddle, though, for all
the narrow escape I had. It was the best accident I ever had in all my
life.”

“Canoeing isn’t always as easy as it looks,” said Bob, as they walked
along. “By the way, we haven’t even asked you how you came to upset. It’s
because we have had so much else to talk about and think about.”

“Why,” said Harvey, “there isn’t much to tell. I don’t hardly know how it
happened, myself. I went to change my position in the canoe, as I was
cramped with kneeling in one position so long. I suppose I lost my
balance a little, but I was overboard so quick I don’t know, myself, just
how it did happen. I must have wrenched myself as I went over, for the
minute I tried to swim I felt a pain in my side.”

“That’s the way with a canoe,” said Tom. “It doesn’t always tip over.
Moreover it just slides out from under one, without even capsizing at
all. That’s usually when one is kneeling or sitting up on a thwart, and
the centre of gravity is high in it. When one is low down in a canoe it
is rare an accident ever happens. We never have had a bad spill in
several years of canoeing, except when we got caught in the storm this
summer, and that was because a paddle broke.”

They had now reached the camp, and Tom and Bob launched their canoe and
paddled away. They did not return to their own camp, however, but headed
down the island. When they had reached the Narrows they carried across
into the other bay, and then started down along the shore at a good clip.
They were in search of Harvey’s canoe.

Several miles down they found it, lodged gently on a projecting ledge. It
was uninjured, beyond a little scraping of paint from the canvas, and
they took it in tow and returned to the Narrows. They carried both canoes
across, and then, when they had paddled up toward Harvey’s camp a way,
they took his canoe up on shore and left it.

That night, when Harvey’s camp was asleep, they paddled down quietly, got
the canoe, and towed it out to the yacht _Surprise_. They lifted it
aboard and left it there, for Harvey to find in the morning.

“There’s just as much fun in that kind of a joke, after all, if one only
looks at it that way,” said Tom, as they paddled home to bed.

“My! but it seems good to be back in the old tent once more, eh, Tom?”
exclaimed Bob, as they turned in.

“Good? Good’s no name for it,” returned his chum. “The Warren cottage is
fine, but I like to hear those waves creeping up on the beach as though
they were coming clear into the tent. It just puts me to sleep.”

The next moment bore truth to this assertion.

The next afternoon, as the sun was just sinking down through the trees
beyond Harvey’s camp, a band of six boys marched along the shore and
through the woods, singing as they went. If they had not known every inch
of the way as they did know it, a beacon-light on the shore would have
guided them.

All afternoon Harvey and his crew had worked, making preparations to
receive them. They had gathered wood, lugged water, brought stuff down
from the village, brought in the lantern from the yacht to aid in the
illumination, and had, indeed, laid themselves out to do honour to their
guests.

Harvey extended a hand to welcome them, one by one, as they came up.

“That was a fine joke you played on us last night,” he said, warmly, as
Tom and Bob appeared. “If you fellows keep piling it on, you’ll have me
buried under a debt of gratitude that I never can attempt to pay.”

“Looks as though you had made a good start at it,” said Bob, pointing to
one of the benches, where a huge supply of food lay heaped.

“Well,” replied Harvey, “just watch Joe now. He’s going to give us a
treat. If any one knows how to broil a chicken over the coals, it’s Joe.”

Joe, thus distinguished, had raked over a bed of glowing coals, the
product of a heap of ship’s timbers, nearly consumed, and was preparing
to lay out the aforesaid chickens, split for broiling, upon a big wire
broiler.

“There’s half a dozen of them,” said Harvey, “and they’re the best that
the island affords. You needn’t be afraid—we didn’t confiscate them,
either. We’re all done with that sort of thing.”

“Don’t they smell good!” said young Joe, gleefully.

Soon they had a great dish of the chickens on the table, flanked by a
heaping plate of potatoes, baked in ashes, a pot or two of jelly, several
loaves of bread, and coffee that filled the woods with fragrance.

Then they fell to and ate like wolves. If young Joe had any the best of
it, it was hard to see,—and nobody cared, anyway, for every one did his
level best.

And then, when they had eaten, they sat and sang, roaring away at the top
of their lungs, for it was a fair place for noise and no one to be
disturbed; only the fish-hawks high in their nests and the seals away out
on the ledges to wonder at the unusual disturbance. Then, as the fire
blazed, they told stories of fishing, of hunting, of the search for the
strange yacht, and a hundred other things, more than ever fascinating,
heard under the stars, in the shadow of the woods, in the sight and sound
of the sea, by the firelight.

It was a night long to be remembered, although as yet they did not dream
of those events soon to happen, which would be far more memorable, and of
which this evening by the camp-fire was but the beginning.

                             CHAPTER XVII.
                                THE FIRE

It was nearly midnight when the boys came over the hill, and the
half-moon was just sinking out of sight. They strolled down past the
hotel, whistling a college tune in chorus. The hotel stood out, a big,
black, indefinite object in the enveloping darkness, for the lights had
been out for nearly two hours, and the guests were supposed to be all
abed.

“Hulloa!” exclaimed Henry Burns, pointing to a faint gleam that shone
from a basement window. “John Carr has forgotten to put out his lamps in
the billiard-room. Old Witham will give him fits when he finds them
burning in the morning. Wait a moment, and I’ll just slip in through this
window and put them out for him. If the colonel should find them, just as
likely as not he would discharge John for wasting five cents’ worth of
oil.”

So saying, Henry Burns, with the best of intentions, shoved up the sash
and crawled into the billiard-room in the basement.

The boys stood around the window, waiting for him to return, but one and
all thrust their heads into the open window as Henry Burns suddenly gave
a whistle of surprise.

“Say, fellows,” he called, turning the lights up stronger instead of
extinguishing them. “Look what John Carr’s done. He’s left all the balls
and cues out, instead of locking them up. Wouldn’t the colonel be
furious? I’ll tell you what we’ll do. Old Witham always drives us out of
the billiard-room, so we’ll just stop and play one game now and I’ll make
it all right with John Carr. He wouldn’t care, and he will be glad enough
to have things put to rights, so Witham won’t find them out in the
morning.”

George Warren, as the eldest of the brothers, demurred at first. “We’ve
been up to enough pranks this summer,” he said, “and we don’t want to get
into any more trouble.”

“But we’re not going to do any harm,” persisted Henry Burns. “We’ll only
play one game, just for the lark of playing at this time of night, and to
get ahead of old Witham; and then we’ll put everything away shipshape and
put out the lights, and no harm done.”

It did not take much argument to influence them; and in a moment they
were all inside, each equipped with a cue, and engaged in the forbidden
game. The time passed faster than they knew, and one o’clock found them
there still.

But, late as it was, a most unusual hour for any Southport dweller to be
astir and abroad, there were at least three individuals who were not abed
and asleep; and with these three we shall have to do in turn.

It so happened on this morning that Squire Brackett had important
business that took him across to Cape Revere, on the mainland; and, as no
steamer was due to run across till afternoon, and he must be there in the
morning, he had arranged to sail over, taking advantage of the ebb-tide,
which served strongest shortly after midnight. He was sleepy and surly as
he came down the road, but paused a moment in his haste as he caught the
gleam of light and heard the sound of subdued voices from the half-opened
basement window.

Squire Brackett stole up softly and peered inside.

“Aha!” he exclaimed, under his breath. “So that’s the way the young
rascals treat Colonel Witham, is it? I’ll just see about that in the
morning. I fancy Colonel Witham will have something to say about this
breaking and entering. I’d call him down now and trap them at their game,
if it wasn’t that I’d lose a tide and a twenty-dollar bargain by it.”

And the squire tiptoed craftily away, chuckling maliciously to himself at
the thought of how he would aid in punishing the boys on the morrow.

The second man of the three who were to figure in the night’s adventure
had set out some two hours ago from afar down the island on the obscure
western side. If any of the boys had seen him rowing in from a yacht
anchored just off shore, had seen him land on the beach and drag his boat
well up on it with supreme strength, and had seen him set off through the
fields and along the strips of beaches of the coves, if any of the boys
had seen all this and had looked carefully into his forbidding face, with
its malign, evil expression, it is probable that that boy might and would
have seen a striking resemblance to that same individual whom he had seen
in flight on a certain evening, and have wondered and feared what
business could bring him back to the scene of former danger at this hour.

Not being seen by them, nor by anybody else, the man slunk along, now
running, as a clear stretch of field opened up before him, now thrusting
his way through clumps of alders, now skirting the shore of some little
inlet.

At length he struck fairly across the island, directly toward the very
town from which, a few weeks ago, he had made so hurried an exit. Coming
finally in view of the hotel, he squatted down in the grass and surveyed
the prospect long and carefully before approaching nearer.

Squire Brackett, going on down to the hotel, would not have been so much
at ease had he felt the presence of this evil figure, crouching within a
few feet of him as he went by, and following stealthily in his footsteps,
pausing as he paused, and watching him wonderingly as he peered into the
window at the boys.

Now, as the squire went on his way, the man, himself, crawled up to the
window and cast a quick glance within.

What he saw clearly startled him, for he had expected to find the hotel
in utter darkness. He seemed to hesitate for a moment, then quickly drew
away from the window.

“So much the better,” he muttered. “They won’t stop me, and if only some
one has seen them there they’ll get the blame.”

Stealing around to the second window distant from where the light came,
the man took a short piece of iron from a coat pocket and proceeded to
pry the window open. Its flimsy lock broke easily under the pressure, and
he sprang inside. He may have known where he should find himself, for in
the darkness he appeared at home. It was the hotel’s storeroom, and was
crowded with a litter of boxes and barrels; loose straw lay in profusion,
and a barrel or two of oil stood in one corner.

It was scarce a moment from the time the man had entered till he sprang
out again. But now his manner was altered. No longer proceeding with
caution, he started on a run for the fields whence he had come, holding
his arms hard to his sides as he ran.

Up the long slope of the hill he dashed, breathing hard, rather, it would
seem, from some deep excitement than from the exertion. So he went on
without interruption for nearly a mile. Had he seemed less beset by some
fear that drove him recklessly on, and been more mindful of his road, he
might have avoided the third person who was abroad this night, and who
now suddenly loomed large in it.

Plunging desperately along through the rough pasture, following an
uncertain path as it wound in and among clumps of cedars and alders, the
man all at once ran full tilt into another man, or, rather, a large,
heavy-set youth, and, clutching at each other, they both fell sprawling
upon the ground.

“Hulloa!” exclaimed Jack Harvey, for he it was, “you seem in a confounded
hurry, my friend, and that’s something new on this island, I’ll be bound.
Why don’t you—” but, as they scrambled up together, Jack Harvey
grumbling, but inclined to treat the incident as a rough joke, the man
lunged out heavily at him with his fist and struck him full in the face.

Jack Harvey was no coward. He clinched with the man, and they reeled for
a moment in a fierce embrace. But the man had muscles of iron, and,
nerved to desperation, more than matched Harvey. Presently he threw the
youth to the ground, and as Harvey struggled to his feet again he dealt
him a blow between the eyes that stretched him flat, and for a moment
stunned him.

Before Harvey had regained his feet and collected his senses, the man was
off, running harder now than ever.

When Harvey finally stood upright, his first impulse was to set out in
pursuit of his mysterious adversary. On second thought he paused a moment
to consider the matter.

Who could the stranger be, and where could he be going? There was one
thing Jack Harvey did know. He knew every living soul on all the island,
man and boy, and this man was not of them. There was not a fisherman
along this part of the coast with whom Harvey had not cast a line or
raced with his yacht, the _Surprise_. He had looked the man fair in the
face twice in their struggle, and thought for the moment that he had
never seen him before.

He had come from some other island, or the mainland, then, and, as was
evident, he was in desperate haste to return. He must, then, have a boat,
presumably a sailboat, waiting for him, and that boat must be moored
somewhere along the western shore of the island. The man’s haste and fear
of being delayed argued that he had been up to some bad business,
“Thieving at the hotel, perhaps,” said Harvey.

And then Harvey, knowing every bush and tree and nook and corner, and
every rock and cove on all the shores of the island, ran over quickly in
his mind the inlets along the coast, to pick out the most likely spot he
knew of where a man might choose to moor his yacht and steal ashore; and
the proof of his accurate knowledge was that the mental picture he drew
of the place was that very cove toward which the stranger was now
travelling, and where there lay snugly at anchor the strange yacht.

With this clearly in mind, Jack Harvey resolved to follow in pursuit,
although the man had now some ten minutes the start. Harvey had the
advantage, however, that, whereas the man knew only the general direction
he must take, to Harvey every inch of the way was as familiar as the
ground around his own camp. For instance, he knew, when the way led
through Captain Coombs’s grove of woods, that through the centre, the
most direct way, it was boggy and hard travelling, and that one could
save from one to three minutes by skirting along the end nearest the
town, and going through there in a smoothly travelled path.

Again, and most profitable of all, there was full five minutes to be
gained by swimming the narrow opening of Gull Cove, instead of following
the line of the shore in the way it spread out in the shape of a huge
pear. At the point which the stem of the pear would represent, the
passage from the bay into the cove, it was only a matter of two rods
wide.

Jack Harvey did not even stop to remove his trousers, blue blouse, and
tennis shoes, but plunged in and swam across.

What he had gained by this was soon apparent, for, as he ascended the top
of a low bank on the farther shore, he saw running along the beach, not
many rods distant, the man whom he was pursuing.

Now the chase had become simplified and was easy for the rest of the way.
There could be no doubt of the man’s destination. Jack Harvey, covering
himself with rock and tree, made no effort to come up with him, but took
his time in following, knowing where he should ultimately find him.

Presently Harvey left the shore, ascended the bank to a roadway which led
down the island, followed it for a few rods, cut across a narrow strip of
field, seated himself deliberately upon a gnarled tree-trunk, and looked
out upon a tiny inlet that was just discernible through the bushes.

There, of a certainty, lay a pretty sloop at anchor, and presently there
came to Harvey’s ears the creaking of the halyards and of the ropes in
the blocks as the mainsail fluttered up.

“He’s in a tearing rush to get away, sure enough,” muttered Harvey. “Now
he is getting up the anchor, and slatting it up in lively style, too. But
he is a stronger man than I am, there’s no mistake about that,” and
Harvey felt of two lumps on his head that bore witness to the man’s
violence.

“If I only had Joe Hinman and Allan Harding here now he wouldn’t sail
away so easily. But that’s neither here nor there. I’ll know that elegant
hull, however, and I’ll know that slick-setting suit of sails anywhere in
all this bay, and I’ll get even with him yet. The _Surprise_ couldn’t
catch that boat in a race in a hundred years, but I’ll catch him napping
somewhere between here and Portland, or I have sailed this bay for
nothing.”

The yacht, its sails filling to the light morning airs, sailed slowly out
from its place of hiding and faded away into the darkness.

Jack Harvey, waiting a moment longer to rest, started off on an easy
jog-trot back to camp. “For,” said he to himself, “the _Surprise_ must up
anchor and after that fellow before daylight. We’ll catch him first, and
then find out what he has been up to. Perhaps he is another—

“Why, by Jove!” exclaimed Harvey, suddenly, “what a fool I am! How could
I ever have forgotten for a moment where I saw that face once before? The
man in the rowboat! Whoop! And that yacht is the _Eagle_, as sure as my
name is Harvey. And that man is Chambers. And to think I came across the
bay with him, alone at night!”

The cold drops of perspiration stood out on Harvey’s forehead at the very
thought of it.

Over hills and through woods ran Harvey, his arms pressed close to his
sides and his head down. He had gone about a mile in this way when, upon
emerging from a dense clump of bushes and ascending at the same time a
little hill, he paused to survey the prospect ahead.

The sight that met his eyes astounded him. Up against the black morning
sky there streamed a broad flaring of red, irregular and uncertain. Now
it streamed up in a widely diffused glare. Again it darted up in a series
of sharp streaks of red.

“Heavens!” cried Harvey. “It’s the hotel and it’s all on fire! Now I know
it’s Chambers, for certain. Now I know why he struck me down. Now I know
what we’ll hunt him for and what we’ll catch him for.”

Harvey, redoubling his speed, raced for his camp.

While this strange chase of Harvey after the man had been going on, even
more exciting things had been happening at the hotel.

Shortly before the time the man had run into Harvey in the pasture and
knocked him down, the boys had finished an absorbing game of billiards,
had put cues and balls carefully away, extinguished the lights, and left
the hotel.

They were in high spirits at their harmless adventure, as they walked a
short distance together, and then separated.

“I think I’ll go along with you,” said Henry Burns to Tom and Bob, “if
you’ll give me that spare blanket to put down on the floor.” And the boys
locked arms with him in answer, as they said good night to the Warrens.
They were soon inside the tent, and, too weary to undress, threw
themselves down with their clothes on to sleep.

But scarcely had they closed their eyes when the sound of persons running
hard roused them, and they recognized the voices of the Warren boys,
calling to them in excited tones.

The next moment the tent was burst open, and George and Joe Warren thrust
their heads inside.

“Get up! Get up, boys, quick!” they cried, and Arthur, appearing the next
instant, added his voice to the others. “Hurry!” they screamed. “The
hotel’s afire and the flames are pouring out of the basement windows.
We’ve got to give the alarm, and there’s no time to be lost.”

Tom and Bob and Henry Burns groaned in anguish; but the three sprang up
and darted out of the door.

“Could we have done it? Oh, how could it have happened?” moaned Bob, as
his teeth fairly chattered with excitement.

“I don’t see how,” answered Arthur Warren. “I put the lights out myself,
and we didn’t light a match in all the time we were there.”

“Never mind,” said Henry Burns. “We’ve got to give the alarm. We’ve got
to see that everybody gets out, and let the rest take care of itself.”

And they started on the run for the hotel. The fire was already plain to
be seen, for the flames were gaining the most rapid headway, and a dense
cloud of smoke mixed with flame poured out of the basement windows.

They rushed madly up the hotel steps, found the doors locked, smashed in
one of the big front windows opening into the parlour, and one and all
crawled inside, screaming “Fire!” at the top of their lungs.

Almost the first person they encountered was Colonel Witham, rushing down
the front stairs to the office, his red face looking apoplectic with
excitement.

“What’s this?” he yelled, as he came down-stairs two steps at a time.
“Some more of your practical joking, I’ll be bound.” But then, as he
breathed a choking cloud of smoke that by this time had begun to pour in
from the direction of the parlour, he changed his tone.

“Good for you, boys!” he cried. “I guess you’ve saved us this time.
Scatter through the halls now, quick. You can do it quicker than I can.
We mustn’t let any one burn to death.”

The colonel was, indeed, out of breath and nearly helpless, and could be
of little assistance.

The boys needed no urging. They ran from one end of the long halls to the
other, up-stairs and down, pounding on every door and startling the
inmates of the rooms from sleep.

The guests, rushing out on each floor into darkened halls, and smelling
the all-pervading smoke, were ready to jump from windows in panic; but
the boys ran quickly among them, explained just where the fire was, just
what the particular danger was, and guided them all to escape.

Thanks to them, not a life was lost, although there were several narrow
escapes. Once when the guests had assembled and a count was taken to see
that no one was missing, some one exclaimed: “Well, where’s Mrs. Newcome?
Has any one seen her?”

Then there was a rush and a scurrying for the second floor, but the
guests were met on the stairs by Joe Warren and Tom Harris, carrying the
little old lady in their arms. They had knocked at her door and had
received no response, and so, hurling themselves at the flimsy door, had
burst it in, and found her on the floor in a dead faint.

“Perhaps this will kind of square accounts with the poor old lady,” said
Joe Warren, as they laid her gently down at a safe distance from the
fire. “She used to complain that we made more noise than a band of wild
Indians, and were always disturbing her afternoon naps, but I guess she
won’t complain of our disturbing this nap.” Then the boys left her in the
care of the guests, and hurried back to the fire.

The fire had gained rapid headway, and there was no hope of saving the
new part of the hotel, at least. The old-fashioned town fire-engine came
rattling up in charge of Captain Sam, but, though the guests and
villagers and the boys all took turns at the pumps, the machine could do
little more than throw a feeble stream up as high as the base of the
second-story windows. The water-supply of the hotel, which was pumped by
a windmill at a distance, was of more avail, but it was helpless against
the headway that the flames had gained.

Soon the whole front end of the hotel collapsed, sending up a fierce
cloud of smoke, ashes, and sparks.

“Lucky we’re not in there now,” exclaimed one of the guests. “By the way,
has anybody stopped to think that we should all probably have been burned
to death if it hadn’t been for these boys that we’ve been complaining of
all summer? Guess we’ll owe them a vote of thanks, at least, when this is
over.”

“We can’t be too thankful that everybody’s saved,” said another.

“That all may be,” growled Colonel Witham, “but I can’t see so much to be
thankful for in watching a twenty-five thousand dollar hotel burn to
pieces, and I’ve got the lease of it—” But his sentence was interrupted
by a piercing wail that came from the scene of the fire, and, following
the sound of the noise, one and all looked up in time to see a large,
handsome tiger cat leap from a window from which smoke was pouring to a
narrow ledge which was as yet untouched by the flames. There it crouched,
crying with fear.

“Oh, it’s poor Jerry! It’s my poor Jerry!” cried a thin, piping voice,
and old Mrs. Newcome, roused from her faint, came forward, trembling and
waving her hands helplessly. “Oh, can’t somebody save him?” she cried.
“He knows more than lots of these boys. Why don’t somebody do something?”

“Can’t erzactly see as anybody’s goin’ ter risk his life for a fool cat,”
muttered one of the villagers. “There ain’t no ladder’ll reach up there.
Guess Jerry’s a goner, and lucky it ain’t a baby.”

Waving her hands wildly and moaning, Jerry’s old mistress was a pathetic
sight, as Henry Burns went up and spoke to her.

“I’m afraid I can’t do much,” he said, “but I’ll try. You just wait here,
and don’t take on so. I know some things about climbing around this hotel
that the others don’t.” And he gave a quiet smile. Then he suddenly
darted across to the old hotel, and, before any one could stop him,
disappeared up the stairs. Wholly unmindful of the fact that a human
being was risking his life for that of a dumb animal, old Mrs. Newcome
took fresh hope and screamed shrilly, in words intended to encourage the
terrified Jerry.

All at once the crowd of guests and villagers saw a boy’s slight figure
at the edge of the hotel roof in relief against the sky.

“Who’s that?” they screamed. “I thought every one was safely out,” cried
one to another.

“It’s that Burns boy, and he’s going to save Jerry,” piped old Mrs.
Newcome. “He’s—”

A howl of indignation drowned her voice, and a chorus of voices rose up
to Henry Burns, demanding that he return.

But, helpless now to prevent, they saw him coolly divest himself of his
coat, seize hold of a lightning-rod, and go hand over hand quickly to the
top. Then he stood for a moment on the only remaining wall of the hotel,
for the rest of the roof, though not yet aflame, had caved in and broken
partly away from the end wall.

Along this narrow strip of wall crept Henry Burns; but when he had come
to the end of it there was a sheer drop of ten feet down to the ledge
where the cat crouched, wailing and lashing its tail.

“Go back! Go back!” screamed those below. “You can’t do anything.”

But Henry Burns, paying not the least attention, reached one hand into
his pocket, drew from it a piece of rope, which he proceeded to lower
till it dangled within reach of the unfortunate Jerry.

“Grab it, Jerry! Grab it!” piped old Mrs. Newcome; and, whether in answer
to the familiar voice or from an appreciation of the situation, Jerry
fastened his claws into the rope, clawed at it furiously till all four
feet were fast, and so, miaowing shrilly, was drawn up to safety by Henry
Burns.

Back along the wall he crawled, and, sliding down the lightning-rod, was
once more on the roof of the old hotel. Then, with Mrs. Newcome’s cat
perched on his shoulder, he shortly reappeared below, amid the cheering
of the crowd.

“I’ll never say you boys are bad again and ought to be horsewhipped,”
sobbed old Mrs. Newcome, as she fondled her pet.

But she got no farther, for a moment later the end wall, on which Henry
Burns had stood shortly before, was seen to sway violently. Then, with a
wrenching and tearing, as of beams split apart, and with grinding of
timbers, it collapsed upon the roof of the old hotel, and a few minutes
later that, too, was all ablaze, and there was nought to be done by any
one but to stand helplessly and see the flames devour everything.

When morning lighted up the spot where on the previous day the hotel had
stood, the pride of the village and the boast of Colonel Witham, the sun
shone only on a charred and blackened heap of ruins.

                             CHAPTER XVIII.
                               THE FLIGHT

Southport, rudely awakened from sleep as it had been, and awake all the
rest of the night by so unusual and stirring an event as a fire, was too
much excited to go back to its slumbers, but stayed awake through the
morning hours to discuss it. A group of villagers hung around the
grocery-store all day long, adjourning only now and then to journey to
the spot where the hotel had been, where they stood solemnly
contemplating the ruins, with all-absorbing interest in the twisted and
distorted fragments that still bore some resemblance to whatever part
they had constituted in the structure of the building.

There were dozens of theories advanced as to how the fire had started.
The oil had exploded from spontaneous combustion; rats had set the blaze
by gnawing at matches, and so on through the list of ordinary causes of
fires; but as for Colonel Witham, with his customary suspicion of all
human nature, he was sure of one theory, because it was his own, and that
was, that the hotel had been set on fire. This he doggedly asserted and
as stubbornly maintained. The hotel could not have set itself afire;
therefore, some one must have done it. This was as plain as daylight to
the colonel.

He fiercely questioned John Carr as to whether any lights had been left
burning, but John Carr was loud and persistent in his assurances that the
hotel had been as dark as Egypt when he had retired for the night.

But throughout all the discussion, that ranged through cottages, along
the streets, and that spread throughout the length and breadth of the
island, there were six boys who were silent, who took no part in it, but
who kept away from wherever a group was gathered.

They were a serious-looking lot of boys as they assembled on the shore in
front of the tent; so much of anxiety and apprehension showing
unconcealed in their faces that one happening upon their council might
have read therein a key to the mystery. It would have been a mistaken
clue, of course, but it would have sufficed for the village and for
Colonel Witham.

For a few moments not one of them spoke, though each boyish brain was
turning the one awful subject over and over, vainly seeking the answer
for a problem that defied all attempts at solution.

Finally Bob broke the awful silence.

“How could it have happened?” he exclaimed. At which there was a
universal whistle and a shaking of heads.

“You see,” continued Bob, “it’s absolutely necessary for us to decide in
our own minds, the first thing, whether it was our fault or not. Because,
if it was, I suppose we’ve got to own up to it sometime or other, and we
may as well do it first as last.”

“Better now, if at all, than later,” said Tom. “They might have some
mercy on us now, being grateful that they didn’t burn up.”

“All but Colonel Witham,” said young Joe. “Catch him being grateful for
anything, with his hotel in ashes.”

“Keep quiet, Joe!” exclaimed George Warren, sharply.

The very mention of Colonel Witham’s name was irritating. It was only too
certain that no mercy could be expected from the colonel.

“But,” said Arthur Warren, “we’re not to blame, so why should we consider
that at all? You remember,” he continued, turning to Henry Burns, “how we
waited after I had blown the last lamp out and the room was absolutely
dark, and we had to stand still a moment till our eyes got accustomed to
the darkness before we could find our way to the window?”

“I remember that,” answered Henry Burns; “and not one of us lighted any
matches all the time we were there, because the lamps were all burning
dimly when we went in; but,” he added, somewhat desperately for him,
“that is not going to save us the moment an investigation begins, if they
have one. The first time they begin to question one of us we’re done for.
The moment they know we were in there last night, that will settle
everything in their minds.”

“And what then?” asked young Joe.

“Well,” said Henry Burns, more calmly, “it means that we’ve got a
twenty-five thousand dollar hotel to pay for.”

The proposition was so absurd that they burst out laughing; but it was a
short-lived and bitter merriment, and they could just as easily have
cried.

“What would our fathers say?” said Arthur Warren. “Ours told us we’d have
to make our pocket-money go a long way this summer, because he rigged the
boat all over for us. There couldn’t any of us pay for the hotel in all
our lives.”

“Perhaps they’d send us to jail,” suggested young Joe.

This happy remark was received with howls of indignation, and the
originator of it was invited to clear out if he couldn’t keep quiet.

“They couldn’t send us to jail,” said Arthur, gravely, “for, at the
worst, we could convince them that it was accidental. We may be
nuisances, but we’re not criminals. Wouldn’t it be better, on the whole,”
he concluded, “to make a clean breast of it to father, and do whatever he
says is best?”

“I’d do it in a minute,” said George Warren, “but when I know we didn’t
set the fire, even accidentally, I hate to put all that trouble and worry
on father; because, you see, we might not be able to convince him
absolutely that we may not, in some way that we don’t know of, have been
responsible. Of course, if it comes to it, we’ll tell him all,—and he’ll
believe it, too. That is, he’ll believe that we are telling what we think
is right, for we’ve always done that way, because he puts confidence in
us.”

“Then,” said Bob, “we’ve got to keep out of the way for awhile till this
thing blows over some. Everybody that sees us now will stop and ask us
how we first saw the fire and all about it.”

“They’ve done that already to us,” said George Warren. “And, luckily, we
could say truthfully that we first saw the fire from our cottage piazza.
And we said we ran down to your camp and roused you boys. Now that is all
right for a touch-and-go conversation, but suppose they see fit to follow
it up, we’ll soon find ourselves either obliged to lie or to confess.”

“Then what are we going to do?” asked Tom.

“Take a fishing-trip,” suggested young Joe.

They looked at young Joe savagely, for each knew in his own heart that it
was running away from danger,—but it was significant that not a boy
objected.

“We’ve been planning one for a week or more,” urged Joe, in extenuation
of his plan. “And we needn’t stay long. We can come back in a day or two
and then start right out again, so as not to attract attention by being
gone too long.”

“I suppose a little trip down among the islands wouldn’t be so bad for
our health,” said Henry Burns, dryly; but it was clear he had no great
liking for the plan.

And so, in a vain endeavour to escape from what seemed to them a most
unfair and cruel predicament, and without realizing that it was the worst
thing they could do, the boys agreed to start early on the following
morning in the _Spray_ for a cruise.

Much surprised was Mrs. Warren when informed of their plan.

“And just as everybody is telling what brave boys you were,” she said.
“They all say that half the guests would have lost their lives if it
hadn’t been for you.”

This was worse than punishment, and the boys groaned inwardly, for Mrs.
Warren had taught her boys to respect her, and they valued her good
opinion more than anything else in the world. They went off to bed soon
after supper, “so as to get an early start in the morning,” they said.

It was early that same evening, while the boys were at tea, that Squire
Brackett stepped ashore from his sailboat in a perfect fever of
excitement.

“I knew it and I said it,” he muttered to himself, slapping one hard fist
into the palm of the other hand. “When I saw that blaze across the water
this morning, and knew that it couldn’t be anything else than the hotel,
I says to myself, ‘Those boys have done it, with some of their
monkey-shines,’ and that’s just the way of it. By Jingo! but won’t
Colonel Witham jump out of his skin when I tell him what I saw through
that window.

“P’r’aps them ’ere boys won’t be’ so much inclined to tying other
people’s dogs to ropes and drowning them when they get caught for setting
fire to a fine hotel!”

And so, nearly bursting with the magnitude of his secret, and bristling
with more than his usual importance, Squire Brackett hurried up from the
landing and lost no time in finding Colonel Witham and escorting him in
great haste to his own home.

There on the veranda of Squire Brackett’s house sat the two worthies,
while the squire poured out his news into the eager colonel’s ear.

“Whew!” exclaimed Colonel Witham, when he had heard it all. “We’ve got
them at last and no mistake. What’s more,” he added, jumping from his
chair and stamping vigorously on the piazza floor, “I’ll prosecute them,
every mother’s son, to the extent of the law. It’s breaking and entering,
too,—forcing their way into my hotel at night,—and the fire was caused by
their criminal act. That’s serious business, as they’ll find before I get
through with them. Blow me if I don’t take the boat for Mayville this
very night, and see Judge Ellis and get the warrants for Captain Sam to
serve first thing in the morning!”

“I’ll go with you, colonel,” cried Squire Brackett. “We’ll be back here
before midnight, and be all ready at daylight to arrest them. Reckon
we’ll surprise folks a little.”

And so, chuckling maliciously together, the squire and the colonel waited
eagerly for the whistle of the little bay steamer, upon hearing which
they walked arm and arm down to the wharf and went aboard, with their
heads together, in great satisfaction.

Their trip must have been greatly to their liking, for some hours later
found them coming ashore again, evidently in a most agreeable state of
mind; and as they bade each other good night on the veranda of the
squire’s cottage, the colonel might have been heard once more to exclaim,
exultantly: “We’ve got ’em this time, squire! They can’t get away.” And
so strode away, caressing in one hand some crisp, official-looking
papers, which boded no good in their contents to six boys whose names the
colonel had given with evil delight to the judge at Mayville.

Very early next morning good-hearted Captain Sam might have been seen at
the door of his home, his fist clenched and his face burning with
indignation. Colonel Witham and Squire Brackett stood by the stoop.

“Now look here, colonel,” exclaimed Captain Sam, hotly, “you surely ain’t
going to ask me to serve these papers on them innocent young lads?
There’s some mistake, somehow, and the way for us to do is to get them up
here and just give them a talking to; ask them all the questions you
want. I’ve watched them boys for a good many summers now, ever since they
was little shavers no bigger’n mackerel, and I tell you they wouldn’t do
no wicked thing like setting fire to a hotel full of people, and there
ain’t nobody on this island mean enough to believe it.”

“We didn’t come here asking you for advice,” sneered the squire. “You’re
a constable of this village, sworn to do your duty, and your duty is to
serve these warrants, the same being legally drawn and signed by the
judge. That’s all your part, and all we ask of you to do. We take all the
consequences.”

“Well, it’s a shame. It ain’t the right thing to do, squire, as you ought
to know, having a boy of your own. But, as you say, it’s my duty if you
insist, and I’ll do it,—but it’s the hardest job I ever done in all my
life.”

“Let’s go down to the tent first,” said Colonel Witham. “There’s always
two of them down there, and sometimes more. If Henry Burns is there, I
just want to get my hands on him. I suspect he’s been fooling me all
along and playing his tricks on me, when I thought him in his room
asleep.”

The dew was still heavy on the grass and the sun had not lifted its face
above the distant cape when the three men walked down to the tent upon
the point. Not a sound broke the early morning quiet, save the cawing of
some crows in a group of pines, and the lazy swash of the sluggish
rollers breaking on the shore.

“They’re fast asleep,” whispered Squire Brackett. “We’ll give them a
little surprise—just a little surprise.” And he gave a hard chuckle.

Captain Sam, at this same instant, casting his eyes offshore and hastily
surveying the bay with the quick, comprehensive glance of an old sailor,
gave a sudden start, and, for a moment, an exclamation of surprise
escaped him.

“What is it?” asked Colonel Witham. “Did you remark anything, Captain
Sam?”

“Nothing,” answered Captain Sam. “I was just a-muttering to myself.”

And at this moment the squire threw open the flap of the tent, saying, as
he did so, “If you boys will—”

But as he and Colonel Witham poked their heads through the opening, the
sentence was abruptly cut short.

“Empty!” gasped the colonel.

“Gone!” cried the squire.

The tent was, indeed, deserted.

“Where can they be?” asked Colonel Witham.

“I know,” answered the squire. “Up at the Warrens, of course. They are
there half the time. It simply means we capture them all at once and save
trouble. Come on, Captain Sam, you don’t seem to be in much of a hurry to
do your duty, as you’re sworn to do.”

Captain Sam was, indeed, in no hurry. He loitered behind, stopped to tie
his shoes, dragged one foot along after the other slower than he had ever
done before, while every now and then, as he followed in the footsteps of
the colonel and the squire, he cast a hasty glance over his shoulder out
on the bay. What he saw must have pleased him, for on each occasion a
broad smile spread over his face and a mischievous twinkle kindled in his
eyes.

The colonel and the squire strode along impatiently, pausing now and then
for Captain Sam to catch up with them; but as they drew near to the
Warren cottage Captain Sam quickened his steps and halted them.

“You two will have to stay here,” he said, with an authority he had not
shown before. “I’m commissioned with the serving of these warrants, and
I’m going to do it; but Mrs. Warren is a nice, motherly little woman, and
I don’t propose to have three of us bursting in on them like a press-gang
and frightening her to death. I’m just going to break the news to her as
best I know how, and I don’t want no interfering.”

So saying, and with face set into a reluctant resolve, the captain walked
on alone, leaving the colonel and the squire much taken aback, and too
much astonished by the sudden declaration of authority to attempt to
dispute it.

What Captain Sam said to Mrs. Warren only she and he knew. There were no
boys called in to listen to what was said. There were no boys there to
see how Mrs. Warren’s face paled and how the tears rolled down her
cheeks, nor to hear Captain Sam’s words of burning indignation as he
tried to comfort her. No boys came to gather about her chair, to assure
her it was all a dreadful mistake. There were no boys to face the colonel
and the squire and declare their own innocence.

But out on the bay, with all her white sails set to catch the morning
breeze, the yacht _Spray_ was beating down toward a distant goal among
the islands. And aboard her were six boys, whose hearts were heavy and
whose faces were drawn with an ever present anxiety. For a time they cast
apprehensive looks back at the disappearing village, but as the morning
wore on and no pursuing sail appeared, they became more cheerful; and to
forget so far as they could the real cause of their flight, they talked
hopefully of the fish they expected to catch and the swimming and other
sport along the white sands of the island beaches.

But although no familiar craft as yet followed where they sailed, there
was, far in the lead of them and some miles down along the island, a
yacht they all knew, and in whose mission, had they but known it, their
deepest interests, their very fate, in fact, lay.

Jack Harvey had lost little time in reaching his camp. While he ran the
fire blazed brighter and brighter, sending an angry glare over the waters
of the bay and lighting up the country around. Looking back now and then,
he could see men and women running about in the light of the fire, and
the frantic, though unavailing, efforts of the village fire department to
stay the flames.

“Seems funny,” he muttered to himself, “to be running away from a fire,
and the greatest fire we ever had on this island at that. I never did
such a thing before, but I guess there’ll be something more exciting
ahead than a fire before we get through.”

Harvey found his camp deserted, as he had expected. Not a sign of life
showed about the place.

“They’re all up to the fire,” said Harvey; “but I’ll bring them soon
enough, though I reckon they’ll be mad at first to have to leave when the
fire is just at its best.”

And he began ransacking the camp, rolling up blankets, tying them into
compact bundles and hurrying down to the shore with them, where he
deposited them in a rowboat.

He made a pile of the rude dishes that the camp afforded, a saucepan, a
fry-pan, tin dippers, and a few tin plates, tying them all together in a
bundle and rattling them all down to the shore in great haste.

Finally he got a boatload of the stuff, and, jumping in, sculled the
little craft out to the _Surprise_. Leaping aboard, he rushed down into
the cabin, threw open a locker, drew forth a big tin horn, which he
raised to his lips, and blew four loud, long blasts in succession.

“The hurry signal will surprise them, I reckon,” he exclaimed; “but
they’ve always answered it before, and I guess they’ll come,—even from a
fire.” And Harvey began stowing the stuff away aboard the yacht. Then he
proceeded to untie the stops in the mainsail, and was thus engaged when a
voice hailed him from the shore.

“Halloo, Jack!” came the call. “What’s the matter? Why aren’t you up to
the fire? What’s up?”

“Wait a minute,” answered Harvey. “I’m coming ashore. Are the others on
the way?”

“Yes,” answered the boy on shore, who proved to be Joe Hinman; “but they
don’t like it a bit. It’s a shame to lose this fire, Jack. Why, you ought
to see Colonel Witham. He’s the craziest man I ever saw, running around
and begging everybody he sees to rush into the blaze and save his old
office furniture.”

“Well, Joe,” said Harvey, as he stepped out of the small boat on to the
beach, beside the other, “we’ve got some work cut out for us that beats
watching a fire all to pieces. I’ll tell you all about it, but there
isn’t one half-minute to lose now. Believe me, you fellows won’t regret
it,—hello, here are the others!”

The three other members of the crew, George Baker, Allan Harding, and Tim
Reardon, burst out of the woods into the clearing, gasping from running,
and amazed beyond expression that Harvey should have called them from the
fire.

“Fellows,” said Harvey, “I’ll tell you the whole story just as soon as we
get aboard and up sail. This is the greatest thing we ever did in all our
lives; but it’s the minutes that count now, and we have got to get under
way the quickest we ever did yet.”

And then, as the boys hesitated, and Joe Hinman ventured the question,
with something of suspicion in his tone that he could not all conceal,
“Why, Jack, there’s no trouble, is there—no trouble—about the fire?” it
suddenly dawned on Harvey that this sudden departure did have a queer
look to it, and that he was, indeed, open to their suspicion.

“Yes,” he cried, “there is trouble, and it’s about this fire; but it
isn’t our trouble. The trouble is for the man that set it,—and we are
going to make it for him. We’re going to catch him. Now will you hurry?”

“Will we?” exclaimed George Baker. “Just watch us!”

And every boy made a dash for the camp to secure anything he might need
on a cruise down the bay.

Harvey and Joe Hinman seized two big jugs and made off for the spring,
whence they returned quickly. Then the entire crew piling into the small
boat, they were soon aboard the _Surprise_.

The anchor was up in a twinkling. The sails were never spread in such
time. Almost as quickly as it takes to tell it, the yacht _Surprise_ was
under way, and with Harvey at the wheel was standing out of the little
harbour.

Then, as they left the glare of the fire upon the waters astern, but
still flaming like a giant beacon against the sky, Harvey, with his crew
about him, narrated his extraordinary adventure with the strange man, and
asserted his conviction that the man was none other than the same
Chambers who had fled from the island not long before.

“That is a fast boat, and we can never catch her in plain sailing,” said
Allan Harding. “She is full half again as big as we, and she would sail
around us a dozen times and then walk away from us without half-trying.”

“I know that,” said Harvey, “and that is just why I am so anxious to
catch up with him before he gets out of the western bay into the open
sea. If we don’t get him in the bay we shall lose him. Now let’s overhaul
everything, and be sure that something doesn’t break just as we come to
the pinch.”

There was little to be done, however, on that score; for, however
carelessly they lived ashore, they had the true yachtsman’s spirit aboard
the _Surprise_, and kept her shipshape. Then they set the club and jib
topsails, for there was not much air stirring, and they drew the tender
up close astern, so it would drag as little as possible.

“We have one advantage,” said Harvey. “We can depend upon it, he knows
enough not to try the open bay and sail down toward the Gull Islands. The
first part of the way is clear sailing enough, but when you get down just
off the islands you come to the shallows, and a man has to follow the
marks to get clear and safely out to sea. And then, too, the alarm is
going to be sent out just as soon as a boat from the village can get over
to the mainland. They won’t lose any time about that,—and Chambers is
sharp enough to know it. He knows the whole bay down below there will be
alive with boats, just as soon as they get the news wired down to them.

“Depend upon it, Chambers will try to fool them. I think he will come
through the Thoroughfare at this eastern end of Grand Island, which he
must have studied out on the charts. He will not dare to try the
Thoroughfare to-night, however, and if we can only beat down to somewhere
below the Thoroughfare to-night we shall be well to windward of him in
the morning, and he will think we are a boat coming in from outside,
while he will still be beating into the wind, if it holds from the
south’ard, the way it is blowing now.”

“That’s right,” said Joe Hinman. “He cannot make the passage out through
the Thoroughfare in the night, unless he knows the way better than I
think he does. It is a bad run in the dark, even for a man that was born
around here. We have done it only once or twice ourselves.”

“You fellows turn in now, all but Tim,” said Harvey, “and get some sleep.
We two can run her for awhile. I’ll call you, Joe, in about an hour or
two, to handle her while I get forty winks, but, mind, everybody will be
called sharp the minute we clear Tom’s Island, for no knowing what we
shall see then at any minute. Chambers will lie up in Seal Cove for an
hour or two, I reckon, if he has got down that far. I only wish I was
sure of it. We’d go ashore and take a run across the island and catch him
napping—

“By the way, George,” exclaimed Harvey, “how do you feel? It’s mighty
lucky you happened to be taken with that colic in the night, just at the
right time, and that I started out to rouse up old Sanborn to get some
ginger for you. All this would never have happened if it hadn’t been for
you.”

“Why, I’m all right,” answered George Baker. “I could hardly walk when we
first saw the fire, but I just made up my mind I wasn’t going to miss it,
and so I started out. When the sparks began to fly I forgot all about the
pain, and I hadn’t thought of it since. It’s all gone now, anyway.”

Two hours later they were nearing the southern end of Grand Island and
coming in sight of a chain, or cluster, of smaller islands, through which
an obscure and little used passage ran from the western bay to the outer
sea. Jack Harvey had sent young Tim into the cabin to snatch a wink of
sleep, and Joe had come up, heavy and dull.

“I’ll go without my sleep this once,” said Harvey. “Here, Joe, hold her a
minute. I’ll get a bit of rest right here on deck, with one eye open.”

It was growing light fast now, and they strained their eyes for a sail.

“I guess we are in time,” said Harvey, as they came abreast of Tom’s
Island. “He is not in sight. We’ll head out to sea a bit more, and cut
into the Thoroughfare farther down, for the tide will be high in an hour,
and we can cross Pine Island Bar. Then, if he has taken the channel on
the other side of Tom’s Island, we can still head him off,—unless he went
through in the night.”

And Harvey, having relinquished the tiller to Joe, stretched himself out
at full length on the seat to rest.

Thus they sailed for a short cut into the Thoroughfare at a point where
they could command the farther of the two channels.

And, as they sailed, so sailed another and a larger sloop, beating its
way out to sea through the farther channel. A man, powerfully built, and
with a hard, desperate look in his eyes, sat at the wheel,—and he was all
alone. The yacht cut a clean path through the smooth waters of the
Thoroughfare, and, as the man looked at the coast-line along which he was
passing rapidly, he muttered: “It’s a clear passage; a safe run to sea.
And, once there, who’s to say I was ever in these waters? I said I’d have
revenge on this town for what I’ve lost, if it took all summer, and I’ve
done it. The blaze did me good as it lit the sky. Twenty minutes more and
I’ll be clear of this, and good-bye to this coast for ever.”

But even as he said it a smaller sloop turned the head of an island half
a mile ahead, and came down the Thoroughfare, running off the wind.

                              CHAPTER XIX.
                              THE PURSUIT

Great was the rage of Colonel Witham and Squire Brackett when they
discovered that the boys had escaped.

“But it will be only so much the worse for them in the end,” said the
squire. “The fact of their running away is a confession of guilt, and
will count hard against them when we once get them into court.

“Colonel,” he continued, gazing off on to the bay, “I believe that’s them
now, about two miles down along the shore. Cap’n Sam, you’re a sure judge
of a sail. Isn’t that the _Spray_ beating down along the island, just off
Billy Jones’s beach?”

Captain Sam took a most deliberate observation, turned a chew of tobacco
twice in his cheek, and then remarked, laconically:

“That’s the _Spray_, sure’s a gun. There is no mistaking the queer set of
that gaff-topsail. It always was a bad fit, and it sticks out just as
crooked like, two miles away, as it does close on. Y-a-a-s, there’s the
youngsters, and no mistake.”

Captain Sam did not see fit, however, though a constable, sworn to do his
duty, as the others had suggested, to explain that he had seen the
_Spray_ for the last hour or more, and that he had been conscious all
along of the precious time they were losing. But a sharp observer might
have detected him chuckling down deep in his throat as the colonel and
the squire stormed and raged.

“Well, what are we going to do?” cried Squire Brackett. “We’re losing
valuable time here. That little boat eats fast into the wind, they say,
and we have got to get started pretty quick if we expect to overhaul her
between now and dark.

“Come! What do you say, Cap’n Sam? You know the boats in the harbour
better than I do. Whose is the best one to go after them with?”

“Wa-al,” drawled Cap’n Sam, “if I do say it, I suppose the _Nancy Jane_
is about as good as any in a long thrash to windward,—if she does belong
to me. She’s big and she’s roomy, and there’s a comfortable cabin in her
for you and the colonel—for I suppose you’ll want to go along.”

“Go along!” exclaimed Colonel Witham. “I should say we did—eh, squire?
When these ’ere warrants are served I want to be there to see it done,
and so does the squire, I reckon.”

“That’s what I do,” responded Squire Brackett. “We’ll go along with you,
sure enough.”

“Then you want to be getting some grub aboard right away,” said Captain
Sam, with a fine show of energy and haste, “while I break the news to my
wife. She’ll put me up a bite to last a day or two. You can’t tell, you
know, when you start off on one of these ’ere cruises, where you’ll end
up nor how long you’ll be out,—so you want to come prepared to stay.”

And then, as the colonel and the squire hurried off down the road, he
turned back for a moment to Mrs. Warren, who stood weeping, and said,
with rough good-heartedness:

“Now, don’t you go to taking on, Mrs. Warren. There’s some mistake here.
Depend upon it. I’ve known them youngsters ever since they was no
bigger’n short lobsters, and I know they ain’t got nothing bad enough in
’em to go to setting a hotel afire.

“P’r’aps there might have been some little accident,” he added, more
conservatively. “Accidents always is happening, you know, and we’re all
of us liable to ’em. I’ve got to do my duty, Mrs. Warren, bein’ as I am a
constable of this town, sworn to obey my orders as I get ’em, signed and
sealed from the court; but I’m goin’ to stand by them boys, all the same.

“So you just go and get your husband down here, quick as ever you
can,—and we’ll settle this ’ere difficulty pretty soon, I reckon.

“And see here,” he said, in conclusion, “if Mr. Warren gets here by
to-morrow noon, that’ll be time enough. And that gives you a chance to
take the boat up to-day if you hurry, and bring Mr. Warren back with you.
I’ll sorter guarantee we don’t fetch up here again till to-morrow
afternoon, so don’t you worry.” And with a sly twinkle in his gray eyes
the captain took his leave, and rolled along lazily toward his home.

He was still eating a hearty breakfast when the colonel and the squire
burst in upon him, hot with impatience. But the captain was provokingly
deliberate, and finished a few more huge slices of bread and a biscuit or
two, and two cups of coffee and a few of his wife’s doughnuts, before he
would budge an inch.

“The boys can’t escape,” he said, by way of assurance to the impatient
pair. “They can’t go across the Atlantic in a little sardine-box like
that, if it has got a mast and a bowsprit and a cabin to it. We’re bound
to fetch up with them quick enough. Have a cup of coffee, colonel!
Squire, sit down and drink a cup of coffee! Mrs. Curtis knows how to make
it, if anybody does.”

But the colonel and the squire refused impatiently, and by dint of
nagging and voluble persuasion they got Captain Sam started, and the
three went down to the shore.

The news had spread abroad by this time,—thanks to the colonel and the
squire,—and quite a number of villagers and cottagers had gathered to see
them off.

What they said was not complimentary to the worthy two, for the boys, in
spite of their pranks, were universally liked, and the whole village had
not done with praising them for their bravery at the fire.

“Why don’t you go and arrest Jack Harvey and his crew?” cried one of the
villagers. “Looks mighty queer to have them clear out, every one of them,
the morning of the blaze. Dan French, he saw them standing out by his
point early that morning while the fire was blazing its hardest. Reckon
that looks a sight queerer than it does to wait a whole day.”

“Well! Well! I guess they had a hand in it,” cried Colonel Witham, as he
stepped into the yacht’s tender. “We’ll hunt them up, too, later on. They
are all mixed up in it, I’ve no doubt. Wait till we get the boys we are
after now, and we’ll make them confess the whole thing.”

It certainly did look suspicious, this flight from both camps and from
the Warren cottage, just after the fire; and the villagers, however well
disposed they might be in the boys’ favour, or however much inclined to
show leniency, could not explain it away.

“They must have been up to some of their pranks,” they said to one
another, “and somehow got the hotel on fire. Colonel Witham must be
right,—and, besides, Squire Brackett says he’s got the proof. He must
know something bad, or he would not be so certain.”

And to this conclusion, reluctant as they might be to come to it, there
fitted, in startling corroboration, the coincidence of their being the
first to discover the fire,—the first to give the alarm.

And the villagers sympathized all the more, for this conclusion, with
Mrs. Warren, as she took the boat for home that morning, bravely keeping
back her tears, and receiving courageously their kindly assurances,
though her heart was breaking.

The _Nancy Jane_ was a heavy fishing-boat, of the centreboard type, big
and beamy and shallow of build, able to “carry sail” in the worst of
weather, but not so marvellously fast as one might have been led to
believe by the recommendation of her owner. However, it was quite true
that she could overhaul the _Spray_—only give her time enough, and
provided no accident should happen.

“She’s got a bit of water in her,” said Captain Sam. “So make yourselves
comfortable, gentlemen, make yourselves comfortable, while I pump her
out. She’ll sail faster and point up better with the water out of her,
and we’ll all be more comfortable.”

And the colonel and the squire made themselves anything but comfortable,
fretting and fuming at the delay.

The captain took it leisurely, however, yanked the pump for ten minutes
or more, to the accompaniment of short puffs of his pipe, and then
pronounced her dry as “Dry Ledge at low tide.”

The colonel and the squire were neither of them sailors; so they could
only wait on Captain Sam’s pleasure. He finally made sail on the _Nancy
Jane_, got up anchor, brought her “full and by,” and they began the long
zigzag chase down the bay in the teeth of the wind.

The breeze freshened as they drew out of the shelter of the island shore,
and down between the nearer islands Captain Sam could see the line of
breeze show black upon the water.

“Looks like a right smart blow by afternoon,” he said.

Colonel Witham looked up apprehensively.

“It doesn’t get dangerous, does it?” he asked.

Captain Sam laughed dryly.

“Guess you’re not much on sailing, colonel, are you?” he asked, by way of
reply. “Bless you! We don’t get a dangerous blow in the bay once in a
summer. No, you need not worry about that. There’s no danger; but I
wouldn’t wonder if we had a bit of a chop-sea when the wind freshens.”

The colonel looked more at ease.

“No,” he said, “I’m no sailor. I manage to make the voyage down the river
to the island, but that is as much seagoing as I have ever wanted, and
this will be my first real ocean experience.”

“Not what you’d hardly call an ocean experience, either,” said Captain
Sam, grinning from ear to ear. “No,” and he said the words over to
himself as though they afforded him no end of amusement, “a slat to
windward from the point to Gull Island ain’t just what one would call an
ocean experience, though it does shake a body up now and then in a blow.”

Dinner-hour came, and they had the _Spray_ well in sight, some miles
ahead and pitching hard.

“We’ll eat a snack,” said Captain Sam, who was never so happy and hearty
as when he had his hand on the wheel of the _Nancy Jane_. “Colonel, have
one of Mrs. Curtis’s fresh doughnuts, just fried this morning, make you
feel like a schoolboy.”

But the colonel, pale of face, declined.

“I—I don’t seem to feel very hungry just this moment,” he stammered.
“Late breakfast, you know. Er—by the way, is it going to blow much
harder, do you think?”

“No great shakes,” responded the captain. “Guess there may be another
capful or two of wind in them ’ere light clouds out yonder. It may
freshen a bit, but that’s all right. That’s just what we want. The harder
it blows the more the _Spray_ will pitch and get knocked back. It’s the
kind of a breeze that the _Nancy Jane_ likes, plenty of wind and a rough
sea. The wind is bound to go down by sunset. It’s the way these
southerlies act.”

“By sundown!” groaned the colonel. “That’s hours yet, and I’m sure we’ll
tip clear over if this boat leans much more.”

“Built to sail on her beam,” explained Captain Sam. But at this moment
the _Nancy Jane’s_ bow snipped off the whitecap of a roller somewhat
larger than its predecessor, and the spray flew in, drenching the colonel
from head to foot.

He yelled with terror. “We’re upsetting, sure!” he cried. “Let’s turn her
about, Captain Sam, while there is time, and start again when it’s
lighter.”

“Nonsense!” said Captain Sam, with a grin. “You’re a bit shaken up, but
you’ll feel better by and by. Just go into the cabin and lie down a
little while. That may make you feel better.”

Perhaps it had been so many years since Captain Sam had experienced the
awful misery of seasickness that he did not realize that the worst thing
the colonel could do was to go down into the dark, damp, musty-smelling
cabin of the old fishing-sloop. Perhaps he really did think that the
colonel would feel better for it. But whatever his motive was, it had a
sudden and deadly effect on Colonel Witham. Indeed, he had scarcely stuck
his head into the stuffy cabin, had certainly no more than gotten fully
within, before he staggered out again, with an agonized expression on his
face, and sank, limp and shivering, to a seat, with his head over the
rail.

“Oh! Oh!” he groaned. “I think I’m going to die. I’m awfully sick; never
felt so bad in all my life. Can’t you put me ashore, Captain
Sam—anywhere, anywhere? I don’t care where, even if it is a deserted
island. I’d wait there a week if I could only get on shore.” And the
colonel groaned and shivered.

It was obvious there was no way of going ashore, however, as they were
some miles distant from it. There was nothing for the unhappy colonel to
do but to make the best—or the worst—of it.

“Cheer up, colonel,” said Captain Sam, pulling out the stub of a black
clay pipe, lighting it, and puffing away enjoyably. “I’ve seen ’em just
as sick as you are one hour, and chipper enough to eat raw pork and climb
the mast the next. You will be feeling fine before long,—won’t he,
squire?”

But as the squire evidently had his doubts in the matter, owing
particularly to the fact that he was not too much at ease himself, his
response was rather faint; and the captain was left to the entertainment
of his own society. He enjoyed himself for the next hour or two with a
sort of monologue, in which he proceeded to analyze audibly the relative
chances of the little yacht ahead and the _Nancy Jane_.

“They are doing surprisingly well for a small craft in windward work,” he
muttered. “They handle her well. Still, the _Nancy Jane_ is eating up on
them. I say about sundown we shall be able to run alongside—Hulloa! If
they are not changing their course to run down the Little Reach! Thought
they knew better than that. Why, it’s what they call a ‘blind alley’ in
the cities. Well, I’m surprised. They know the bay pretty well, too; and,
only to think, they go to running in to a thoroughfare which really is
nothing more than a long cove. They’ll fetch up at the end of it in an
hour or two, and there’s no way out.”

The captain’s voice almost seemed to express disappointment that the
chase should end so tamely.

“Colonel,” he cried. “Squire. It will be all over in a few hours now.
They’re running into a trap.”

But the colonel and the squire were beyond interest in the pursuit.

The yacht _Spray_ had, indeed, started its sheets, and now, with the wind
on its beam, was running off toward a group of small islands, or ledges,
on a course nearly at right angles with that which it had been taking.

The boys had watched the _Nancy Jane_ anxiously for the last few hours.

“They are steadily coming up on us,” George Warren had said. “Too bad we
could not have got a few hours more start. We might have given them the
slip then when night shut down.”

“But we are not sure that they are after us, are we?” asked young Joe.

“No, but it looks pretty certain,” replied his brother George. “There’s
nothing particular to start the _Nancy Jane_ down here, and she is
Captain Sam’s boat and he is the town constable.”

“Then what had we better do?” queried Tom. “There is not much use running
away, if we are sure to be caught inside of a few hours. We’d a sight
better turn about and start back, as though we had finished our sail.
That would look less like running away.”

It was noticeable that, having once set out to escape, they accepted the
situation now fully, without more pretence.

“We have got to decide before long,” said Henry Burns. “The _Nancy Jane_
is overhauling us fast.”

“George,” said Arthur Warren, “I know one chance, if you want to try it,
and if you are willing to risk the _Spray_,—and I think it would save
us.”

“What is it, Arthur?” asked George. “If it is any good, I’m for trying
it. I can’t see as we have anything great to risk, with a twenty-five
thousand dollar fire charged to us.”

“What is it, Arthur?” exclaimed the others, excitedly. It did not seem
possible there could be any chance of escape open, but they jumped
eagerly at anything that offered a faint hope.

“Well,” said Arthur, in his deliberate manner, “you know the small
opening between Spring and Heron Islands at the foot of Little Reach?
Nobody ever ran a sailboat through there because it’s choked up with
ledges. But you remember when the mackerel struck in to the Reach there
last August, we all went down in the _Spray_ for a week’s fishing. Well,
one day Joe and I took the tender and worked our way clear through
between Spring and Heron Islands to the bay outside. Now the _Spray_,
with the centreboard up, does not draw very much more water than the
tender, and by dropping the sails and all poling through, I think we can
work her in clear to the other side.”

“We’ll try it,” said George Warren. “It is the only chance we have, so
we’ve really no choice.”

And he put the tiller up and threw the _Spray_ off the wind, while Arthur
and Joe started the sheets. It was this sudden manœuvre which had
startled Captain Sam.

They soon passed the entrance to Little Reach, two barren ledges shelving
down into the water, and were well down the Reach when Captain Sam and
the _Nancy Jane_ headed into it.

“There they go,” cried Captain Sam, “like an ostrich sticking its head
into the sand. Well, what can you expect of boys, anyway? We’ll overhaul
them faster than ever now, because this big mainsail draws two to their
one this way of the wind, and the jibs aren’t doing anything to speak of,
the wind varies so in here.”

It was smooth water inside Little Reach, and, as there was now scarcely
any motion to the _Nancy Jane_ as she skimmed along by the quiet shores,
the colonel and the squire began to revive a little, sufficient at least
to regain their interest in the pursuit.

They were about a mile and a half down the Reach, and the _Spray_, not
quite half a mile ahead, was apparently at the end of her cruise.

“They are at the end now,” cried Captain Sam, whose blood was up when it
came to a race between the _Nancy Jane_ and another, though smaller,
craft. “We’ve got ’em like mice in a box.”

“By George! look there, colonel—look, squire!” he exclaimed, excitedly.
“They have given it up. There go the sails. It’s all over. They may scoot
ashore, but the island on either side is nothing more than a rock. Well,
I vow! But I didn’t think they would quit so tamely after a game race.”

“We’ll make ’em smart for what we have suffered to-day, eh, colonel?”
growled the squire.

The colonel grunted assent. He was not yet sufficiently himself to be
very aggressive.

“What on earth are they doing?” said Captain Sam, a few moments later.
“Looks as though they were trying to hide away among the rocks, like a
mink in a hole. They’ll have the _Spray_ aground if they jam her in among
those ledges.”

The _Spray_, however, slipped in among the rocks, and was shut out from
the view of the pursuers.

“Let ’em hide,” said Captain Sam, contemptuously. “That is a boyish
trick. We’ll be up with them now in fifteen minutes.”

But the _Spray_, hidden from view of Captain Sam and the colonel and the
squire, was not running itself upon the rocks nor poking its nose,
ostrich-like, among the ledges.

The instant the sails were dropped young Joe sprang out on the bowsprit
and lay flat, holding a pole, with which he took soundings as the others
pushed and poled with the sweeps of the yacht.

They ran the bow gently on to rocks a dozen times, but a warning yell
from Joe stopped them, and they turned and twisted and wormed and worried
their way in among the ledges, turning about where a larger craft would
have had no room to turn, and slipping over reefs that just grazed the
bottom of the little _Spray_, and which with two inches lower tide would
have held them fast.

“It’s just the right depth of water,” said Arthur, exultantly. “Luck is
with us this time, for certain. An hour later and we could not have done
it. But we’re going through. There is only the bar ahead now. If we clear
that we are free of everything.”

Just ahead, where two thin spits of sand ran off on either end of the two
islands into shoal water, was a narrow, shallow passage, where the water
was so clear that it looked scarcely more than a few inches in depth, as
it rippled over the bar.

“All out!” cried Arthur, as the _Spray_ grated gently on the bottom, “We
will lighten her all we can,” and they sprang overboard into water
scarcely above their knees.

“Now, Joe,” said Arthur, “you and Henry take the head-line out over the
bows and go ahead and pull for all you are worth. George and I will get
alongside and push, and keep her in the channel, and Tom and Bob can get
aft and push. We have got to rush her over that shallow place, and we
must not let her stop, for if she once hangs in the centre we cannot
budge her. The _Spray_ is not a ninety-footer, but she’s got enough pig
iron in her for ballast to hold her high and dry if she once sticks.”

The boys seized hold quickly, and the _Spray_, lightened of her load,
slid along, at first sluggishly, and then gathering speed, as the twelve
strong, brown, boyish arms pulled and tugged and pushed.

“Jump her, now, boys! Jump her!” cried Arthur, as they neared the shoal.
“We’re doing it. Don’t let her stop, now! Oh, she mustn’t stop! We’ve got
to put her over or die.”

And the little _Spray_ seemed to feel the thrill and joy of freedom
throughout its timbers; for at the words it surged forward with a rush,
as though it would take the bar at a flying leap. The white sands reached
up from the bottom, and the whole bar seemed to be rising up to hold the
boat prisoner, as the water shoaled. But the little _Spray_ kept on.

It hung for one brief, breathless moment almost balanced on the middle of
the bar, and the white sands thought they had it fast; but the next
moment it slid gently from their grasp, gave a sort of spring as it felt
itself slipping free, and the next moment rode easily in clear water,
just over the bar.

The next instant six exultant boys, their faces blazing with excitement
and exertion, had scrambled aboard, falling over one another in their
eagerness to seize the halyards.

They hoisted the sails on the _Spray_ again in a way that would have made
Captain Sam himself sing their praises, and now, with evening coming on,
there was just enough breeze left in among the rocks to waft them gently
along out of the inlet.

They watched breathlessly, as they neared the entrance to the outer bay,
for a glimpse of the _Nancy Jane_; but the _Nancy Jane_, good boat though
she was, was just a moment too late. Scarcely had they turned the little
bluff and were hidden behind it, on their way whither they might choose,
when the _Nancy Jane_ rounded to at the entrance to the channel.

“It’s all done,” Captain Sam had exclaimed, as he threw the wheel of the
_Nancy Jane_ over and came up into the wind, but when he looked to see
the _Spray_, she was not there. Not so much as a scrap of a sail nor the
merest fragment of a hull, absolutely nothing.

Captain Sam was so dumfounded he could only gasp and stare vacantly at
the place where, by all rights, the _Spray_ ought to be.

The colonel and the squire, who had no preconceived ideas about the
passage between the islands, solved the problem at once; but not so the
captain.

“They’ve gone through there, you idiot,” exclaimed the squire, growing
red in the face. “Where else can they be? They can’t fly, can they?”

The captain groaned, as one whose pride had been cruelly smitten.

“To think,” he muttered, “that I’ve sailed these waters, man and boy, for
forty years, only to be fooled by a parcel of schoolboys from the city.
Why, every boy in Southport knows you can’t run a sailboat through
between Heron and Spring Islands. There ain’t enough water there at high
tide to drown a sheep.”

“Well, it seems they got through easy enough,” answered the colonel.

“That’s it! That’s it!” responded the captain, warmly. “They do say as
how fools rush in where angels don’t durst to go, and sometimes the fools
blunder through all right. And here’s these boys gone and done what I’d a
sworn a million times couldn’t be done.”

“Yes, and we probably can get through, too, if we only go ahead and try,
instead of lying here like jellyfish,” exclaimed the squire. “Cap’n Sam,
seems as though you weren’t so dreadful anxious to catch up with them
youngsters as you might be. P’r’aps you might have told Mrs. Warren back
there a few things that might explain this ’ere delay.”

“Yes, and if them boys can go through there, I, for one, don’t see what’s
to hinder us,” chimed in the colonel. “Cap’n Sam, I don’t see what we’re
a-hanging back for.”

And so, his pride humbled, and too mortified to stand by his own better
judgment, Captain Sam reluctantly yielded to their importunities, and
pointed the nose of the _Nancy Jane_ in toward the opening amid the
rocks.

“It can’t be done,” he said, doggedly, “but if you say that I am not
trying to do my duty as a sworn officer of the town, I’ll just show you.
Only don’t blame me if we’re hung up here hard and fast for twelve
hours.”

The _Nancy Jane_, like a horse that is being driven into danger that it
somehow apprehends, seemed almost intelligent in its reluctance to enter
the stretch of reef-strewn water. It bumped and scraped its way from one
rock to another, balked at this ledge and that, and, finally, after an
extra amount of pushing and pulling by the three men, jammed itself fast
on a reef studded with barnacles and snail-shells, and refused to budge
one way or another. In vain they tried to bulldoze and cajole, to push
and to pull, to plead with and to denounce the obstinate _Nancy Jane_.
Stolid and deaf alike to entreaty and expostulation, the boat squatted
down upon the reef like an ugly fat duck, comfortably disposed for the
night and refusing to be disturbed.

“I told you so!” roared the captain, now aroused to his rights as
skipper, and finding himself thus exasperatingly vindicated as to the
impassability of the channel. “We’re hung up fast for the night, for the
next twelve hours, till next flood. Then, if Lem Cobb is living in his
fishing-shack on Spring Island, and will lend us a hand and a few pieces
of joist to pry with, mebbe we’ll get off, and mebbe we won’t.”

The colonel and the squire boiled inwardly; but as it was apparent they
had only themselves to blame, they felt it useless to engage in
discussion with the indignant captain. So they wisely remained silent,
and left him to consume his wrath alone.

“Well,” he said, finally, “I for one am curious to see just where those
young rascals are; and if you’re of the same mind you can satisfy your
curiosity by coming ashore with me.” And the captain waded off to the
rocks of Spring Island and clambered up the bank, closely followed by the
colonel and the squire.

“There they go, slipping along as slick as eels,” exclaimed the captain,
as he and his panting companions achieved the ascent of the highest bit
of rock on Spring Island and looked down the bay. “They’re off down among
the islands,” he continued, “and here we stand like natural-born idiots
and bite our fingers. If ever I get into a mess like this again, I’ll
resign my office of constable and hire out to Noddy Perkins for a
clam-digger.” But the colonel and the squire, too angry and chagrined for
words, stayed not to listen to the captain’s denunciation.

They turned and walked rapidly in the direction of the fishing-shack, the
only shelter the island afforded; while the captain, standing out in
relief upon the rock, like some disappointed Napoleon, was the last
solitary object that the boys saw as, looking astern from the _Spray_,
the little island faded from their view into the twilight.

                              CHAPTER XX.
                           AMONG THE ISLANDS

The yacht _Spray_, with six jubilant boys aboard, sailed slowly away from
Heron and Spring Islands, shaping its course for a group of outer islands
of some considerable size, about two miles away. It was nearly seven
o’clock, but the southerly breeze had not wholly died with the going down
of the sun, and the tide, which had just begun to ebb, was favourable.

“I think we can get across to-night,” said George Warren. “This wind is
going to hold for some hours yet and maybe all night; and we know our way
into Cold Harbour at any hour of the twenty-four. I don’t think Captain
Sam will start to run out of the Little Reach at all to-night, for when
the tide drops there are some bad ledges all along that thoroughfare,
and, besides, he won’t want to run the risk of drifting out here in the
bay, in case the wind should drop. We shall have twelve hours start of
him, anyway, and once among the islands we can keep out of sight for
days.”

“I’d have given something to see the colonel and the squire when they
found we had slipped away from them at the very moment they thought they
had us,” said young Joe. “Didn’t they look funny, standing up there on
the rock, watching us sail away?”

“Captain Sam has my sympathy,” said Henry Burns, dryly, and the very
thought of the disappointed trio arguing it out together sent the boys
into fits of laughter. They fairly rolled over on the seats and hugged
one another.

“It’s the richest joke of the season,” said young Joe.

And so, for the time being, in their elation, the consciousness that they
were runaways, fleeing from possible arrest, was forgotten. The stars
came out, and a lighthouse far and near gave them their course. The water
gleamed with phosphorescence, and the yacht _Spray_ left a wake of
gleaming silver and gold and flashing jewels. By and by the moon came up
out of the sea and threw a radiant path across the waters, and the
islands ahead stood out in huge black shadow.

It was glorious sailing, with the soft summer night air blowing in their
faces; and they sang as they sailed, and yo-hoed all the sea choruses
they knew, and felt so free and irresponsible that the yacht _Spray_, as
though it absorbed some of their spirit, rolled along in a merry,
swinging fashion, rocking gently from billow to billow, dipping and
tossing in time to the music.

The still shores of Eagle Island rang with their songs as they rounded to
in Cold Harbour somewhere near midnight, and came to anchor close to
shore in the deep water, within the shadow of the hemlocks that rose up,
tall and black, almost from the water’s edge, where the tide swashed
gently against the rocks. High up in the thick branches of the great
trees some fish-hawks, startled by the unwonted noise, rose up from their
nests and uttered shrill, piercing screams of fright. And this was their
only welcome, for on all the island there was no other sign of life.

“It’s fairly certain they won’t pursue us to-night,” said George. “But it
won’t do to be caught napping. We’ve got to set watch regularly every
night now, and we might as well begin to-night. Somebody’s got to walk
out on the point of rocks yonder and look out for sails. Two will be
enough till morning. We will split the time from now till six into two
three-hour watches.”

“I’ll begin it,” said Bob.

“My next,” said Tom, not to be outdone by his chum.

Bob rowed ashore in the little tender, and set off at once for a point of
rocks some half-mile distant, which commanded a view of the bay. The
others were sound asleep by the time he was half-way there.

When Tom awoke, about seven hours later, it was broad daylight and the
sun was streaming into the hatchway. He scrambled out in a hurry as Bob’s
voice hailed him from the deck.

“Hulloa! Hulloa!” came the voice. “Are you fellows going to sleep all
day?”

“Why didn’t you come back and rouse me to take my turn?” asked Tom,
reproachfully.

“Well, I wasn’t sleepy,” answered Bob, “and it grew light soon, and I got
to watching a mink fishing for his family, and carrying cunners to them
along the rocks, and I thought I’d let you sleep. It’s tough to wake up,
you know, when one has just dropped off. Come on, we’ll take a swim now.
The water is fine.”

Tom bared a muscular young form, and he and Bob dived off the rail of the
_Spray_, making such a splashing and commotion in the water and bellowing
so like young sea-lions, that the others gave up trying to turn over for
another nap, and came sprawling out of the cabin, diving overboard, one
after another, to join them. Then they had a race ashore, which was won
by Tom, with Bob and Henry Burns a close second; after which they lay on
the beach sunning themselves, and then swam back to the yacht for
breakfast.

“There’s not a sail in sight, and the whole bay is as smooth as glass,”
Bob had announced on his arrival; and, as not a breath of wind was yet
stirring, there was no need of setting watch for the present. So they all
sat down to hot coffee and griddle-cakes, and ate like wolves.

After breakfast they went ashore to explore the island, roaming about
like young savages, leaving their clothing piled in a heap in the tender.
Every now and then, as the humour seized them, they raced down to the
shore, wherever they were, ran along on the fine white beaches, and
cooled themselves in the clear, still water.

They had it all to themselves, for nobody lived on this small island, the
fishermen on the mainland or neighbouring larger islands coming over in
the late summer only, to cut the grass and make the hay.

Then they went back to the tender and dressed, and Henry Burns, daunted
at nothing, tried to climb one of the giant hemlocks to a fish-hawk’s
nest, but gave it up when the birds screamed in his ears and beat at him
with their powerful wings.

They had dug some clams at the low tide in the forenoon and put them
away, covered with wet seaweed. Now, shortly after their noon luncheon,
as the tide flooded, they got out the lines from a locker in the _Spray_
and tried the fishing in Cold Harbour. There were plenty of small harbour
fish, flounders out in the middle where the water was muddy, and cunners
and small rock-cod in among the ledges. They soon caught a basket of
these, cleaned them, and put them away, covered with seaweed, like the
clams.

Then, toward the end of the afternoon, as the bay was still calm, they
set out along the shore and gathered driftwood, which they threw in a
great pile on a flat, clean ledge. As supper-time came, they set this
heap afire and let it burn for an hour or two, until the great flat ledge
was at a white heat. Then they made a broom of some branches of hemlock,
and swept the ledge clean of ashes, and brought the clams and poured them
out on the ledge, covering them all with clean, damp seaweed till there
rose clouds of steam, and, after a time, an appetizing odour.

The fish they cooked in much the same way, wrapping them in big green
leaves and setting them upon the hot stones to bake.

Then, as evening came on, they built the fire anew close by, for a fire
is the cheeriest of companions in a strange place, and sat feasting on
steamed clams and fish, with a great pot of coffee filling all the air
with a most delicious fragrance. They lolled about the fire and ate, till
even slim Henry Burns said he felt like an alderman. They told stories by
the firelight, and stretched out at ease till sleep nearly overtook them
as they lay there; for the day had been brimful of exertion. By and by,
long after the stars were out, and a gentle breeze from the south, coming
up softly from among the islands, just rippled the water, they rowed out
to the _Spray_, Tom returning ashore again to begin the night’s watch.

Then, later in the night, came George Warren’s turn to watch, and he
stayed it out till morning, for, with all the fun of the day, there was
something that would keep turning over and over in his brain, and which
took away the sleepy feeling and left in its stead a feeling of
unhappiness; a sense of something wrong. His father would have said it
was conscience, but George wrestled long and hard through the morning
hours to avoid recognizing it as that, for conscience would say, if
recognized, that it was all wrong, what they were doing,—and George
Warren wanted to think he was having a good time.

These moody thoughts began to dissipate, however, with the coming of the
warm golden glow in the east; and when the sun was at length up, and the
boys had had their morning swim, and sat about a fire awaiting breakfast,
George Warren seemed himself again.

But the breakfast was rudely interrupted by a series of whoops from young
Joe, who had taken his brother’s place on guard at the end of the point
of rocks, and who now came running down alongshore, crying out that there
was a sail that looked like the _Nancy Jane_ coming out from around the
islands across the bay, and they all raced back to have a look at it.

“It’s the _Nancy Jane_, sure enough,” said Henry Burns. “It’s her big
mainsail, with the high peak. She’s making slow headway, though, with
this breath of wind. However, we shall have to be off at once, if we are
going to try to escape.”

It was noticeable that Henry Burns said “if.”

However, as no one felt like proposing to give up, they lost no time in
getting aboard the _Spray_, and had sail on and the anchor up in what
Captain Sam would have called a jiffy. Heading out into the open bay that
lay between them and the outer islands, they bade good-bye to Cold
Harbour and began a long, slow beat to windward, in the light breeze.

“There’s more wind coming, down between the islands,” said Bob. “There’s
a line of breeze about two miles to the southward, and we shall catch it
a good half-hour before the _Nancy Jane_.”

“That’s so; it will give us a fine start,” said Arthur.

But, somehow, no one seemed wildly enthusiastic over their prospects.
However, as they caught the fresher breeze, and the little _Spray_ stood
stiffly up into it and ate away to windward, their spirits rose. Then, as
the islands came plainly into view and they drew nearer and nearer to the
first, big Saddle Island, with its low range of little hills dropping
down in the centre in the shape of a horse’s back, the excitement became
intense; for the _Nancy Jane_ had not rounded the point of Eagle Island,
and it seemed as though they might be out of sight behind Saddle Island
before they could be seen by those aboard the pursuing yacht.

“Go it, old _Spray_! Good little boat!” cried young Joe, as the yacht
glided swiftly up into the shadow of the island. “We’re going to make it,
and, once behind old Saddle, who’s to know which way we have gone?”

“Five minutes more of this sailing, and we shall fool Captain Sam once
more,” said Bob.

The five minutes were nearly up. They had but another leg to run to round
the head of Saddle Island. They stood out till they had one and all
declared that they could clear it on the next tack; they were all ready
to go about. George Warren stood with one hand on the tiller and the
other ready to grasp the main-sheet. Joe and Arthur Warren were waiting
impatiently to trim the jib-sheets, and then—and then George Warren took
their breaths away.

All at once he jammed the tiller over, threw the _Spray_ clear off the
wind, let the main-sheet run, and before they scarcely knew what had
happened, instead of standing in to round the head of Saddle Island, the
little _Spray_ was running dead before the wind and heading squarely back
for the point around which the _Nancy Jane_ must soon come in sight.

It was so quickly done that at first they thought there was some mistake,
and Arthur and Joe and Bob rushed to the stern to help bring her around
again; but George Warren, with a firm, set look on his face, stood them
off.

“Oh, I say, George, you’re not going to give it up now, are you?” cried
young Joe, who had been in high spirits not a moment before.

“That’s what,” responded his brother, quietly. “I’ve thought it all out
at last, and I’ve come to the conclusion we are doing the cowardly thing
to run away. We have got to face the thing, and we may as well do it
first as last. Besides, we didn’t set out to run away when we started.”

“That’s a fact,” said Tom. “We have sort of drifted into this running
away business without realizing what we were doing. Now the best thing we
can do is to go back and have it out with Colonel Witham.”

“It’s not Colonel Witham that I hate to face,” said George. “It’s father
and mother. And the part they’ll feel worst about is that we did not stay
and talk it over with them.”

“That’s so,” added Arthur. “What a lot of loons we were to come down
here.”

“Shall I pull the centreboard up?” asked Henry Burns.

“You bet!” answered George Warren. “And we’ll take a leaf out of your
book, Henry, and we won’t worry over what cannot be helped. We’re doing
the right thing now, anyway, so there’s that much to feel good about.”

“There’s the _Nancy Jane_,” said Henry Burns.

Sure enough, Captain Sam’s pride was just turning the point, and Captain
Sam, looking at the _Spray_ coming down free and pointing its nose right
at him, could hardly believe his eyes.

“It’s them, all right,” he assured the squire and the colonel. “They are
coming back; tired of being runaways, I guess. Well, I thought they would
get sick of it after a night or two away from home. They ain’t the kind
of boys to enjoy running away.”

“Humph!” snorted the colonel.

“They’re a lot of young scamps and scapegraces,” snarled the squire.

Getting aground and spending a night in a bed that the colonel swore was
stuffed with pig iron and seaweed had not improved their tempers.

“Well, anyhow,” responded Captain Sam, “they are coming back of their own
accord, and that is something in their favour.”

The colonel and the squire only sneered.

Meanwhile the little _Spray_ came running down the wind in merry style,
and the end of the next hour found her swinging up into the wind, with
sails flapping, while the _Nancy Jane_ ran alongside.

The colonel and the squire were at last avenged.

Full of wrath was the one, and brimming with wrathful satisfaction was
the other.

“So we have caught you at last, have we?” exclaimed Squire Brackett.

“We seem to have sort of caught ourselves, squire,” answered George
Warren.

“Well, never mind about being smart,” said the colonel, hotly. “You are
under arrest for burning my hotel down. Perhaps that will take some of
the smartness out of you.”

“Under arrest!” George Warren’s face paled. “It isn’t right,” he added.
“We didn’t do it nor have any hand in it.”

“Guess you won’t attempt to deny that you were in the billiard-room, will
you?” broke in Squire Brackett. “Because, bein’ as I saw you all in
there, it might not do you any good to swear as how you wasn’t.”

“Don’t you dare accuse us of trying—” But young Joe got no further.