  Early in the morning Tom, on board the cutter with Mr. Sommerlee, his engineer and two of the patrol, decided that a brisk bit of exercise would be just about the finest appetizer he could desire. There had been no signs at all of any excitement, although Tom had taken his turn with the others at watch while the cutter lay anchored a stone’s throw beyond the mouth of the Shark River. While Lieutenant Sommerlee got the dry-alcohol stove lit up for their hot cocoa and fried eggs, Tom saw no harm in a brisk swim to the mouth of the river and back. Accordingly, while the sun was giving Nicky his first view of the ’Glades, Tom lowered himself from the cutter’s stern, not caring to risk a dive in the poor light, and struck out gaily for shore, wondering, as he swam, how Nicky’s party was getting along, back there beyond the heavy growth that fringed the inner channels. Crawling out on a root, Tom slapped the early morning chill of the water out of his body, and rested before returning to the cutter. He wondered, as he lolled on the roots, whether El Libertad was actually hiding in the river or not. He half wished that he had asked Mr. Sommerlee for permission to swim up the river a ways; it might help them to discover the truth; they had no small boat and would not wish to risk having the cutter discovered before the landing party had its position and gave a signal. “I think I’ll swim up the river a few strokes,” Tom decided. “Nicky swam a ways in Crocodile Creek and we discovered the liquor stores; it won’t hurt me to do a hundred yards and back.” Accordingly he slipped down into the limpid stream, and against a slight current that did not tire him at all, he pulled his lithe, muscular young body along steadily. But when he lifted his head to glance ahead he saw nothing; nothing, that is, but water and low-clustered tree roots on the banks, tall grass, and leaves meeting in a heavy tangle along the banks and, far beyond him, meeting overhead. The Libertad was too close in, behind a tangle of weed and grass, to be visible from his low point of vantage in the water. Suddenly his ears were assailed by a distant thud—like a shot! Tom listened. There was the deep silence of the morning over all of Nature. “Perhaps an Indian is out hunting—or a white man has just shot his breakfast,” Tom mused, and deciding that he had gone far enough he swung lazily, and then set off with brisk strokes. Then he beached and stood up on a ledge of sandy coral reef. The three signal shots bore their triple crash through the woods, followed by Nicky’s final shot. “That sounds more like fighting than hunting,” mused Tom. “I wonder if our land party has made contact! I guess I had better go back to the cutter and see if they have noticed any rocket signals.” He turned and began to swim back. He had gone further than he had intended to, however, and he felt pretty well tired out by the time he came back to the river mouth; so, deciding to rest and to hail the cutter and ask for information, he drew himself up on the root. He saw a flurry of activity on the cutter; quite clearly he had been totally forgotten in some new excitement. The motor was running and Lieutenant Sommerlee, eyes fixed on the far reaches of the river was maneuvering, backing and turning to bring the cutter broadside to the channel. Tom turned to look back up the stream he had recently swam in, and saw, afar, the white spot that would soon become El Libertad, backing out because she could not turn in the channel. Mentally, Tom summed up the situation quickly; if he tried to swim out to the cutter he would interfere with the lieutenant’s plans, and perhaps be in the line of fire if the white vessel continued to approach. He would surely be in line of fire from her stern if he tried to swim to the cutter. Yet, naked and white against the dark foliage, he would be just as much of a target, and quite as noticeable, on his root. Hastily, but warily, remembering saw-tooth grass and snakes as very real menaces to unshod feet and an unprotected body, Tom melted into a thicket of heavy creeper and leaves, and with his eyes peering through his green lattice, he saw the white boat crawl out into view. Then he saw something more. Nicky, still gagged and bound, was up on the after deck, held there by the arm of a man who cleverly kept as much of his person below the coaming of the after cockpit as he could. Tom compressed his lips to hold back his first impulse to call out. How had Nicky gotten into that predicament? What was he doing in the hands of the enemy? He was prompted to shout to Nicky; then sober second thought told him that this might endanger Nicky, and it would certainly draw attention to himself, not very desirable to a white-skinned boy, minus his clothes, and menaced by a pack of men evil enough to treat his chum so rudely. Tom held his position and watched. Evidently it was the intention of the hi-jackers to have Nicky discovered and recognized by the crew of the cutter. Such was, in fact, their aim. Mr. Coleson, compelled to expose a portion of his arms in order to keep Nicky in view, did not like his place nor the rough treatment the boy had received. While he had, it is true, helped to tie the boys on a previous occasion, and had then deserted them in their tender, and, later, with Senor Ortiga, had stolen the tender in order to chase the hi-jackers, he had not in any of this actually intended any violence toward his youthful captives or—as they later became—rescuers! It irked him, and went against his sense of decency, weak though that was, to have Don Ortiga cold-bloodedly crouch beside the engine with a pistol in his hand, holding it trained on Nicky, and, as Mr. Coleson made no doubt, ready to fire with deadly aim. Tom, on the shore, took in Nicky’s plight. Being elevated above the water edge, he was able to see downward beyond the coaming of the cabin sides, and he observed Don Ortiga’s position and its menace. Still he held his lips pressed together. A warning would do no good; silence could do no harm. From the Libertad the hoarse hail of Senor Ortiga came across the water. The Libertad had lost way and drifted very slowly stern-first out of the mouth of the river. Those in the cutter caught the hail also, and the hand Lieutenant Sommerlee had partly raised to call for full speed across the oncoming stem, was suspended in midair. “There’s a gun trained on this boy,” cried the younger Ortiga. “We have his life in our hands. We mean to get free and if you stop us or fire or try any tricks, the boy pays for it!” The position into which the Libertad had drifted was stern-out, so that the cutter was on her quarter, and to the side farthest from Tom’s hiding place. In that position, totally unsuspicious of his presence, no one on El Libertad was paying attention to his side of the river mouth. Two ideas, two courses of action, sprang into Tom’s mind. The first was this: he recalled that when the trio had lain, tied hand and foot on the floor of the Libertad’s cabin, the drip-drip of the gasoline from a leaky carbureter gasket had become very noticeable. He recalled that Mr. Coleson had mentioned it to Senor Ortiga, that night when they had returned from their fruitless hunt, and said he must fix it. The idea Tom had was that if he could manage to get on board, unobserved, and loosen the carbureter or destroy it, the white boat would be powerless to escape. But the men were all congregated at the stern, all except the steersman, up in the cubby where the wheel was located, at the forward end of the cabin. The second idea grew from the first: in the bow was the main gasoline tank; a pipe line of copper ran along, close under the edge of the cabin flooring, and up forward there was a petcock in the line, so that the flow of what Mr. Coleson, in his English fashion, called “petrol” could be cut off in case of a break in the line. “Now,” decided Tom, “if I could get aboard and turn that cock without my action being discovered, the engine would stop as soon as it sucked the compression tank dry—about a tenth of a mile. Then they’d have to surrender or be starved out, and we could signal for help, and certainly pick them off. Maybe, with Cliff, I could plan to get Nicky free first! I’m going to try it!” Tom made as little noise as he possibly could, climbing out of his retreat; if he was discovered, he must be shot! But they were all busy listening to some plea or argument from the lieutenant. Tom made his dip into the water without apparently attracting the least bit of notice. He waded softly, as far as he could, then with deft, quiet strokes, drew steadily, if slowly, closer—closer—closer! If only they all kept out of range below the cockpit and cabin coaming! Evidently, in spite of the danger to Nicky, none of the desperate crew cared for a chance shot from the cutter. They stayed low. Tom reached the side of the almost inert white hull; with only a slight drift taking her gradually past the cutter, she was evidently being permitted to lie still until the drift got her out of the way of the cutter, or far enough into open water so that she could be turned and steered in a forward run. Tom, huddled close under the hull, holding to the loop of the anchor rope which hung down, listened. As he came on he noticed that the cutter was edging up, and that Nicky had been dragged off of the after deck. Tom believed that he knew why. They had threatened to do something to Nicky in order to stop the cutter from edging up. A shrill cry from the Libertad, right over his head, made Tom almost let go of his rope; then he realized that to him it did not sound like Nicky’s voice! They were frightening the lieutenant with a falsified noise, the cry of a falsetto voice among the crew. He could not see, clinging under the hull, but he guessed that the ruse had succeeded; he guessed, also; that, if ever, now was his moment to act. El Libertad had drifted at least a boat’s-length back from the river mouth; probably most of her crew would be looking toward the cutter which must, by the changed position, be off her forward beam. Tom lifted his hand until he could loosen it from the rope without letting the cable slap the side, then dropped back into the water, pulled alongside the hull toward the stern, and there reached up and caught the rail with one hand. Would he be seen? Slowly he drew the other hand to the rail. Nothing happened. He suppled his muscles and then with all their aid working in the slow, upward pull, he drew his eyes level with the deck. They were all forward, intent on something—Nicky or the cutter! Tom pulled himself up higher, made an effort, and by ill fortune, on the instant of success, slipped on the wet rail, and plumped down in a heap in the cockpit, aft. |
|
