  On shore a queer light appeared. It was queer in more ways than one. It was of a peculiar green, an uncanny green; it was not the light of a lantern, shining all around; it seemed like a small window lighted up with an uncanny glow—and it was where no window could be. The light seemed to be moving, very slowly, when Cliff discovered it and without a word directed his comrades’ attention toward it. While they stared, the light came slowly closer to the shore—and yet it did not seem to be carried—it glided along almost imperceptibly. Tom, with a nervous clutch on Mr. Neale’s arm, indicated the open water of the Sound. Across it a boat was moving, slowly, steadily, toward them. Yet, although it came steadily along and they could see the men as dim, ghostly shapes, the oars made no sound as the forms in the boat plied them—bend! straighten!—bend! straighten! The light had stopped moving and seemed to hang, a queer window of illumination, above the water on which its gleam was reflected faintly. The boat came toward them. In its bow a figure stood—and what a figure! In the dim star-gleam it seemed gigantic. Not a sound accompanied the slow progress of the strange craft. “He’s got something in his hand!” gasped Nicky. The man, as the boat came to within thirty feet of the sloop, raised his arm. “It’s a sword—” whispered Tom. “No! A cutlass!” Cliff breathed. The ghostly figure, its head tied up in some sort of cloth, its face a white blur under the white head covering, made a menacing gesture, as of one thrusting at them, with the implement in his hand. Then he lifted the cutlass and with it pointed away toward the passage between the mangroves where they had come into the Sound. “Go away, or you will suffer!” his gestures seemed to say. His boat, still without a sound, like a wraith on the water, swung away toward the light. Hardly breathing, the chums watched. “Boat, ahoy!” called Mr. Neale. There was no response. Like a craft of dreams the boat moved off and they saw it progress steadily to shore. The light, green and gruesome, seemed to grow larger and brighter, and it turned slightly so that it lighted up the shelving bit of sand at the mouth of the inlet. Onto this small beach, with no sound that could be heard, the boat-load of wraith-like figures debarked. They seemed to be all white, like ghosts, in sheets or some sort of glimmeringly pale garments. They bent toward the boat in the glow that made them seem like luminous, greenish shapes of evil. “Look!” breathed Tom, “they’re lifting a chest!” They were! A chest or box of treasure was being shifted to the sand. Several others followed, still without answer to Mr. Neale’s repeated hail. Sam, who had refused to leave his retreat in the stuffy cabin, began to whimper. Through a port-hole, at their captain’s hail, he had stolen one glance. It was enough! Tom, too, was demoralized; but he dared not speak; only by the shaking of his hand on Nicky’s arm did his terror show. On shore there seemed to be a ghostly argument—suddenly, in the greenish glow, knives flashed out, were lifted, were plunged into action! Yet no sound of a fight came across the water. Figures dropped! Forms strove, hand in hand, knives upraised and driven downward! And at one side, a little above the rest, and sharply silhouetted as a tall form in white, stood the one who must be the leader, his cutlass held ready, but making no move. And then, all but one of the contending silent figures was down! The survivor of the battle turned and rushed toward his chief—the glow disappeared and the silence, the darkness, closed down more eerily than ever! “Where are they—what are they doing?” gasped Nicky. Mr. Neale was drawing in on the line that secured the dinghy. “I’m going to see,” he said. For once there were no volunteers for the investigation! Tom begged his chief not to go, but Mr. Neale, with a word of encouragement, assuring them that he felt that the strange scene had more than supernatural explanation, rowed away. The wait seemed interminable. They heard his oars squeal in the rowlocks, saw the dinghy reach the shore and lose way; then there was a silence and an absence of movement. They could not make out what Mr. Neale was doing. “I wish I’d gone along, now,” Nicky said. “I ought to have gone, too—he might need help.” Cliff seconded his chum’s tardy return of courage. But the dinghy was returning! “It’s queer,” Mr. Neale said when he had transferred himself to the cockpit, “I couldn’t find a thing!” “Couldn’t find—no boat—nothing?” quavered Tom. “Not a thing!” There was not much sleep that night and they were all glad to see the sky begin to turn gray, then lighter, in the East, as dawn came. Sam came out sullenly to prepare breakfast. Their supplies were very low for they had laid in only a small store, to keep up their pretence of cruising among islands where food was plentiful. At several points of the shore they had secured yams, corn flour and other necessities, but the meal, with a lean larder and a morose, intimidated cook, yielded little zest or nourishment for even such good appetites as the Mystery Boys usually possessed. “I’m going to suggest that you fellows go ashore,” Mr. Neale said. “I’ll set you on the beach—and be careful about snakes! Then I’ll take the dinghy and go around the point to see that chap we met last night. There is more behind this than we see just now.” “Don’t you think?—” began Tom. “I think a good deal,” the captain replied, “but ghosts are the very last explanation I will accept!” He put Nicky and Cliff on the bank of the inlet, noting that by daylight the sand and undergrowth was trampled and muddied. “No ghosts did all this,” he said. “There is a human agency at work and I want to find out why all this trouble was taken—to scare us.” He went back to the sloop, ordered Sam to pull himself together, and took Tom aboard the dinghy. When he landed the third of the comrades Mr. Neale, repeating his warning about snakes, bade them reconnoiter and find all the signs they could, against his return. Then he rowed off toward the point around which Nelse had said he had a plantation. “Funny Nelse didn’t come back this morning,” Cliff observed. “Maybe he is in the scheme—whatever it is—to scare us,” Nicky mused. “Remember how anxious he was at first, till we said why we are here—and then how emphatic he was about danger?” They did. As they looked about there were plenty of signs to show that human agencies and not ghosts had produced the strange scene the night before. Not only was the ground trampled, but on one mangrove root that bent upward and curved into a sort of prong, they discovered a strip of cloth that looked like part of a bed sheet. But there was no sign of the chests of treasure! “It’s a queer thing!” Nicky declared. His chums agreed. “Say!” exclaimed Tom suddenly, pointing toward the sloop, “what’s Sam doing? Look—he’s hoisting the mainsail!” Sam was doing exactly that. “Ahoy—Sam!” hailed Nicky through cupped hands. Sam did not answer. “Sam! Sam!” shouted all three. They saw the colored man turn and look toward them. Then he picked up a small megaphone that was part of the boat’s equipment and roared at them. “I’m going away from here, sars! Yes, sar! Going from here!” “He’s been scared almost crazy!” declared Cliff, “but he can’t go away——” “——And leave us—and Mr. Neale!” cried Tom. Nicky began kicking off his shoes. As he doffed coat and cap, his chums followed his example. Together they plunged into the water and swam lustily toward the Treasure Belle. It was a race against Sam’s swift movements. The sail was up. The anchor came in with a groan of its chain. Cliff, a few strokes in the lead, redoubled his efforts. The Treasure Belle began to move through the water, taking a puff of wind in the early morning gusts. Nicky and Cliff desisted from their effort. Tom, desperate, seemed fairly to race toward the stem of the moving slope—but her pace accelerated. She stood away toward the neck through which she would apparently head out toward Biscayne Bay and the open water. From the stern Sam waved a hand in farewell! |
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