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CHAPTER III.
AN INVOLUNTARY HAY-RIDE
Louder and louder came the shrieks and cries, and the party, all of them considerably alarmed, rushed around to the front of the house to perceive what this new uproar might mean. They beheld a sight that made Mrs. Soopendyke begin to cry out in real earnest.
One of her family had, in a playful mood, removed the stones which held Hamish’s hay wagon stationary on the steep grade. As a natural result, it began to slide backward down the hill. But what had thrilled the good lady with horror, and the others with not a little alarm, was the sight of three other young Soopendykes, including the baby, on the top of the load. It was from them and from Master Courtney Soopendyke, who perceived too late the mischief he had done by removing the stones, that the ear-piercing yells proceeded.
“Oh, save them! Oh, save my bee-yoot-i-ful children!” screamed Mrs. Soopendyke, wringing her hands, as the ponderous wagon, with its screaming load of children, began to glide off more and more rapidly.
“Great Scott!” shouted Mr. Dacre. “That deep hole in the creek is at the bottom of the hill!”
“Oh! Oh! Oh!” shrilled Mrs. Soopendyke, and fainted just in time to fall into the arms of Hamish, who came running round from the barn.
“Help! Fire! Murder! Send for the fire department!” screamed Mrs. Bijur, with some confusion of ideas.
In the midst of this pandemonium Tom and Jack and their uncle alone kept cool heads. Before the wagon had proceeded very far, the two Bungalow Boys were off after it, covering the ground in big leaps. But fast as they went, the wagon rumbled down the grade – which grew steeper as it neared the creek – just a little faster seemingly – than they did. Its tongue stuck straight out in front like the bowsprit of a vessel. It was for this point that both lads were aiming. Tom had a plan in his mind to avert the catastrophe that seemed almost inevitable.
Mustering every ounce of strength in his body, he made a spurt and succeeded in grasping the projecting tongue. In a second Jack was at his side.
“Swing her!” gasped out Tom. “It’s their only chance.”
But to swing over the tongue of a moving wagon when it is moving away from you is a pretty hard task. For a few seconds it looked as if, instead of succeeding in carrying out Tom’s suddenly-thought-of plan, both Bungalow Boys were going to be carried off by the wagon.
But a bit of rough ground gave them a foothold, and, exerting every ounce of power, the lads both shoved on the springy pole for all they were worth. Slowly it swung over, and the wagon altered its course.
“Steer her for that clump of bushes. They’ll stop her!” puffed out Tom.
“All right,” panted Jack, but as he gasped out the words there came an ominous sound:
Crack!
“Wow! The pole’s cracking!” yelled Jack.
The next instant the tough wood, which, strong as it seemed, was sun-dried and old, snapped off short in their hands under the unusual strain.
A cry of alarm broke out from the watchers at the top of the hill as this occurred. It looked as if nothing could now save the wagon from a dive into the creek.
But even as the shout resounded and the boys gave exclamations of disgust at their failure, the wagon drove into the mass of brush at almost the exact point for which they had been aiming. At just that instant a big rock had caught and diverted one of the hind wheels, and this, combined with the swing in the right direction already given the vehicle, saved the day.
With a resounding crashing and crackling, and redoubled yells from the terrified young Soopendykes on the top of the load, the wagon, as it plunged into the brush, hesitated, wavered, and – came to a standstill. But as the wheels ceased to revolve, Hamish’s carefully piled load gave a quiver, and, carrying the terrified youngsters with it, slid in a mighty pile off the wagon-bed.
Fortunately, the children were on top of the load, and they extricated themselves without difficulty. Hardly had they emerged, however, before a violent convulsion was observed in the toppled off heap, and presently a hand was seen to emerge and wave helplessly and imploringly.
“Who on earth can that be?” gasped the boys, glancing round to make sure all the group was there. Yes, they were all present and accounted for, – Mrs. Soopendyke, sobbing hysterically in the midst of her reunited family, the lads’ uncle, Mrs. Bijur, Hamish, and several other boarders who had been aroused by the explosion, and had set off on a run down the hill as the wagon plunged into the brush.
Before they could hasten forward to the rescue of whoever was struggling in the hay, a bony face, the nose crowned with a pair of immense horn spectacles, emerged. Presently it was joined by a youthful, pug-nosed countenance.
“Professor Dalhousie Dingle?” cried everybody, in astonishment. “And that dratted boy, Douglas Dingle!” echoed Mrs. Bijur.
“Yes, madam,” said the professor solemnly, emerging with what dignity he could, and then, taking his boy by the hand and helping him forth, “It is Professor Dingle. May I ask if this was intentional?”
“Why, dear land, perfusser, you know – ”
“I only know, madam, that while my lad Douglas here and myself were searching for specimens in the thicket we suddenly found ourselves overwhelmed with an avalanche of dried grass – or, as it is commonly called – hay. Bah! I am almost suffocated!”
The professor carefully extricated a “fox tail” from his ear and then performed the same kind office for his son and heir.
“Pa-pa,” piped up the lad, “may I ask a question?”
“Yes, my lad,” beamed the professor amiably stepping down from the pile of hay, which Hamish was regarding ruefully.
“Well,” spoke up Douglas, “if we had not gotten out from under that hay, would we have been suffocated?”
“Undoubtedly, my boy – undoubtedly,” was the rejoinder. “Gross carelessness, too.”
He scowled at the assembled group.
“Would it have hurt, pa-pa?”
“Surely, my boy. Suffocation, so science tells us, is a most painful form of death.”
“Worse than measles, pa-pa?”
“Yes, my child, and – ”
“Perfusser,” interrupted Mrs. Bijur, with firmness, “I want to know what you intend to do about my roof?”
It was the professor’s turn to look astonished.
“What roof, madam?” he asked, still brushing hay-seed from his long-tailed black coat.
“Ther roof of my extension whar you hed thet thar lab-or-at-ory – whar you was making them messes that was liable to blow up.”
“Well, madam?”
“Wall, sir – they done it!”
“They done – did what, madam?”
“Blowed up!” responded Mrs. Bijur, with deadly calm.
“Good heavens, madam – impossible!”
“Not with them Soopendykes around!” was the confident response. “It’s my belief they’d a turned the Garden of Eden inter a pantominium. They – ”
But the professor rushed off dragging Douglas by the hand, his long coat tails flapping in the air as he sped up the road as fast as his lanky legs would carry him.
“The greatest invention of the age has gone up in smoke!” he yelled, as he flew along.
Laughing heartily over the comical outcome of events that might have proved tragic, Mr. Dacre and the boys rendered what aid they could in replacing the hay load, and then started back for the bungalow. The last they saw of the professor he was crawling about on his hands and knees, scooping up fragments of the explosive with a tin teaspoon in one hand, and waving Mrs. Bijur indignantly to one side with the other. They little imagined, as they shook with amusement at the ludicrous picture, under what circumstances they were to meet the professor again, and what a singular part his explosive was destined to play in the not very far distant future.
CHAPTER IV.
BULLY BANJO’S SCHOONER
“Guess this will be your getting-off place.”
One of the deck hands of the smoke-grimed, shabbily painted old side-wheeler, plying between Victoria, B. C., and Seattle, paused opposite Mr. Dacre and the Bungalow Boys. They stood on the lee side of the upper deck regarding the expanse of tumbling water between them and the rocky, mountainous coast beyond. The sky was blue and clean-swept. A crisp wind, salt with the breath of the Pacific, swept along Puget Sound from the open sea.
The surging waters of the Sound reflected, but, with a deeper hue, the blue of the sky. The mountainous hills beyond were blue, too, – a purplish-blue, with the dark, inky shadows of big pines and spruces. Here and there great patches of gray rock, gaunt and bare as a wolf’s back, cropped out. Behind all the snow-clad Olympians towered whitely.
Off to port of where the steamer was now crawling slowly along – a pall of black, soft coal smoke flung behind her – was a long point, rocky and pine-clad like the mountains behind it. On the end of it was a white, melancholy day-beacon. It looked like a skeleton against its dark background.
“There’s Dead Man’s Point,” added the friendly deck hand.
“And Jefferson Station is in beyond it?” asked Mr. Dacre.
“That’s right. Must look lonesome to you Easterners.”
“It certainly does,” agreed Mr. Dacre. “Boys,” he went on, looking anxiously landward, “I don’t see a sign of a shore boat yet.”
At this point of the conversation the captain pulled his whistle cord, and the ugly, old side-wheeler’s siren emitted a sonorous blast.
Poking his head out of the pilot house window, he shouted down at Mr. Dacre and the boys:
“I’m a goin’ ter lay off here for ten minutes. If no shore boat shows up by that time, on we go to Seattle.”
“Very well,” responded Mr. Dacre, hiding his vexation as best he could. “We must – but,” he broke off abruptly, as from round the point there suddenly danced a small sloop. “I guess that’s the boat now, captain!” he hailed up.
“Hope so, anyhow,” ejaculated Tom, while the captain merely gave a grunt. He was annoyed at having to slow up his steamer. As the engine room bell jingled, the clumsy old side wheels beat the water less rapidly. Presently the old tub lay rolling in the trough of the sea almost motionless. On came the boat under a press of canvas. She heeled over smartly. In her stern was an upright figure; the lower part of his face was covered with a big, brown beard. As he saw the party, he waved a blue-shirted arm.
“That’s Colton Chillingworth!” exclaimed Mr. Dacre. “I haven’t seen him for ten years, but I’d know that big outline of a man any place.”
The deck hands were now all ready with the travelers’ steamer trunks. The boys had their suit cases, gun bags, and fishing rods in their hands.
“How on earth are we ever going to board that boat?” wondered Jack, rather apprehensively, as the tiny craft came dancing along like a light-footed terpsichorean going through the mazes of a quadrille.
“Jump!” was Mr. Dacre’s response. “These steamers don’t make landings. I’m glad Chillingworth was in time, or we might have been carried on to Seattle.”
And now the boat was cleverly run in alongside. She came up under the lee of the heavily rolling steamer, her sails flapping with a loud report as the wind died out of them.
“Hul-lo, Dacre!” came up a hearty hail from the big figure in the stern. “Hullo there, boys! Ready to come aboard?”
“Aye, aye, Colton!” hailed back Mr. Dacre. “We’ll be with you in a minute.”
“If we don’t tumble overboard first,” muttered Jack to himself.
“Better take the lower deck, sir,” suggested one of the deck hands.
Accordingly, our party traversed the faded splendors of the little steamer’s saloon and emerged presently by her paddle box. Between the side of the vessel and the big curved box was a triangular platform.
“Stand out on this, sir, and you and the boys jump from it,” suggested the deck hand.
“A whole lot easier to say than to do,” was Tom’s mental comment. He said nothing aloud, however.
In the meantime their baggage had been lowered by a sling. A second person, who had just emerged from the cabin of the little boat, was active in stowing it in the cockpit. This personage was a Chinaman. He wore no queue, however, but still clung to the loose blue blouse and trousers of his country.
“Allee lightee. You come jumpee now,” he hailed up, when the baggage was stowed.
“Here goes, boys,” cried Mr. Dacre, with a laugh. He made a clean spring and landed on the edge of the deck of the plunging sloop. The Chinaman caught him on one side, while the lad’s uncle braced himself on the other by grabbing a stay. Another instant and the boys could see him and Mr. Chillingworth warmly shaking hands.
“Go ahead, Jack,” urged Tom. But for once Jack did not seem anxious to take the lead. He hesitated and looked about him. But he only saw the grinning faces of the deck hands.
“Come on!” shouted his uncle, extending his arms. “It’s easy. We’ll catch you.”
“Hum! If I had my diving suit here, I’d feel better,” muttered the lad. “But – here goes!”
Like a boy making a final determined plunge into a cold tub on a winter morning, Jack leaped forward and outward. He landed right on the sloop’s deck, falling in a sprawling heap. But the active Chinaman had him by the arms and he was on his feet in a jiffy. Tom followed an instant later.
Hardly had his foot touched the deck before the steamer gave a farewell blast and forged onward, leaving them alone in the tossing, tumbling wilderness of wind-driven waters. Somehow the waves looked a lot bigger from the cockpit of the sloop than they had from the deck of the steamer.
They watched the big craft as with a dip and a splash of its wet plates, it gained speed again, several passengers gazing from its upper decks at the adventurous party in the little sloop. Introductions were speedily gone through by Mr. Dacre. The boys made up their minds that they were going to like Colton Chillingworth very much. He was a big-framed six-footer, tanned with wind and sun, and under his flannel shirt they could see the great muscles play as he moved about.
“This is Song Fu, my factotum,” said Mr. Chillingworth, nodding toward the Chinaman, whose yellow face expanded into a broad grin as his master turned toward him.
“How do you do, Song Fu?” poetically asked Tom, not knowing just what else to say.
“Me welly nicely, t’ank you,” was the glib response.
By this time Mr. Chillingworth had set the helm and put the little sloop about. She fairly flew through the water, throwing back clouds of spray over the top of her tiny cabin. It was exhilarating, though, and the boys enjoyed every minute of it.
But as they sped along, it soon became apparent that the wind was freshening. The sea, too, was getting up. Great green waves towered about the boat as if they would overwhelm her. The combers raced along astern, and every minute it seemed as if one of them must come climbing over, but none did.
“Got to take another reef,” said Mr. Chillingworth presently. “Can either of you boys handle a boat?”
“Well, what a question,” exclaimed Mr. Dacre. “If you had seen them managing the Omoo in that gale off Hatteras, you’d have thought they could handle a boat, and well, too.”
“That being the case, Tom here can take the tiller, while I help Fu take in sail.”
Mr. Chillingworth resigned the tiller to Tom, who promptly brought the sloop up into the wind, allowing her sails to shiver. This permitted Mr. Chillingworth and the Chinaman to get at the reef points and tie them down. This done, the owner of the boat came back to the cockpit and she was put on her course once more.
“You handled her like a veteran,” said Mr. Chillingworth to Tom, who looked pleased at such praise coming from a man whom he had already made up his mind was a very capable citizen.
The rancher went on to explain something of his circumstances. He and his wife had come out there some years before. They were doing their best to wrest a living from the rough country. But it was a struggle. Mr. Chillingworth admitted that, although he had big hopes of the country ultimately becoming a new Eldorado.
“Just at present, though, it’s a little rough,” he admitted.
“Oh, we don’t mind roughing it,” responded Tom. “We’re used to that.”
“So I should imagine from the newspaper accounts I read of your prowess,” said Mr. Chillingworth dryly.
“Oh, they wrote a lot of stuff that didn’t happen at all,” put in Jack.
“Not to mention the pictures,” laughed Mr. Dacre.
“Well,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “if there were some enterprising reporter out here now, he would find plenty to write about.”
“How’s that?” inquired Mr. Dacre.
“Why, you may have heard of Chinese smugglers – that is to say, men who run Chinamen into the country without the formality of their obtaining papers?”
Mr. Dacre nodded.
“Something of the sort,” he said.
“Well, they have been pretty active here recently. Some of the ranchers have had trouble with them.”
“But surely they have notified the authorities?” exclaimed Tom.
“That’s just it,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “They are all afraid of the rascals. Scared of having their buildings burned down, or their horses hamstrung, or something unpleasant like that.”
“Well, if you are the same old Colton Chillingworth,” smiled Mr. Dacre, “I’m sure you do not belong in that category.”
A look came over Colton Chillingworth’s face that the boys had not noticed on that rugged countenance before. Under his brown beard, his lips set firmly, and his eyes narrowed. Colton Chillingworth, with that expression on his features, looked like a bad man to have trouble with. But to Mr. Dacre’s astonishment, and the no less surprise of the boys, his reply was somewhat hesitant.
“Well, you see, Dacre,” he said uncertainly, “a married man has others than himself to look out for. By the way, my wife doesn’t know anything about the troubles. Please don’t mention them to her, will you?”
“Certainly not,” was the rejoinder. “But – ”
A sudden cry from the Chinaman cut his words short. The Mongolian raised a hand, and with a long, yellow finger pointed off to the west. The boys, following with their eyes the direction in which he pointed, at first could descry nothing, but presently, as the sloop rose on the top of a wave, they could make out, in the blue distance, the sudden flash of a white sail on the Sound.
“It’s the schooner, Fu?” asked Mr. Chillingworth eagerly.
The Celestial nodded. No change of expression had come over his mask-like features, but the boys vaguely felt that behind the impenetrable face lay a troubled mind.
Mr. Dacre looked his questions.
“What is there about the schooner particularly interesting?” he asked, at length.
“Oh, nothing much,” said Mr. Chillingworth, with what seemed rather a forced laugh. “Except that she is Bully Banjo’s craft.”
“Bully Banjo?” echoed Mr. Dacre, in a puzzled tone.
“Yes. Or Simon Lake’s, to give the rascal his real name. Lake is the man who is at the present time the real ruler of the ranchers in this district,” said Mr. Chillingworth bitterly. “Dacre,” he went on, “I’m afraid that I have invited you into a troubled region. I’ll give you my word, though, that when I wrote to you things were quiet enough.”
“My dear fellow,” was the rejoinder, “don’t apologize. I myself relish a little excitement, and here are two boys who live on it.”
“If that is the case,” replied the other, with a wan smile, “they are on the verge of plenty – or I’m very much mistaken.”
CHAPTER V.
A NIGHT OF MYSTERY
Soon after the sloop beat up into the shelter of the point, the wind having by this time increased, to what appeared to the boys, to be a mild hurricane. The sky, too, was overcast, and big black clouds were rolling in, shrouding the dark trees and heights ashore in gloom, and turning the snow-covered peaks beyond to a dull gray. It began to feel chilly, too.
“We’ll have to run up here and take the trail to the ranch,” said Mr. Chillingworth, after a while.
“I thought it was quite close in here,” rejoined Mr. Dacre.
“Oh, no. It’s a biggish beat along the coast,” replied his friend, “but it’s blowing too hard now to risk beating up the shore. We’ll run in under shelter of the point there, and then we can cut across through the woods and reach the place by trail.”
“But not to-night,” observed Mr. Dacre, pulling out his watch. “It’s after four now.”
“We’ll start out to-morrow morning if the wind hasn’t gone down,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “Fu can bring the sloop round when the wind moderates.”
It was not long after this that, as they ran quite close to the shore, where the rocks sloped steeply down, that Mr. Chillingworth ordered the Chinaman to take in sail. Aided by the boys, this was soon accomplished. To the accompaniment of rattling blocks, the sails were lowered, and presently the anchor splashed overboard. The sloop then lay motionless, about thirty or forty feet off shore.
Supper was cooked and eaten in the tiny cabin, which boasted a stove. As the air had grown quite chilly, too, and the boys were wet with spray, they were all glad to warm and dry themselves in the heat. After the meal the men drew out their pipes, while Fu produced a queer-looking arrangement for smoking. Its bowl was not much bigger than a thimble and made of stone. The stem was a long, slender bit of bamboo.
“Opium?” whispered Tom to Mr. Chillingworth, as the Mongolian stepped out of the cabin to give a look to the anchor.
The rancher laughed.
“No, indeed. I would have no such stuff around me. I broke Fu of smoking opium long ago. But he still clings to his old pipe.”
The after-supper talk was mainly about ranching and prospects in Washington. Mr. Dacre appeared to be much interested in the timber aspects of the country.
“There are millions of feet of good timber around here,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “It can be bought cheap, too, right now. You see, there is no railroad here yet, and no means of getting the timber out. It wouldn’t pay to cut it. But in a few years – ”
He spread his hands. Evidently he deemed the prospects to be very good. Mr. Dacre nodded thoughtfully. Then the two men produced old envelopes and stubs of pencils and fell to figuring. This didn’t interest the boys much.
“Let’s slip outside and see what’s doing,” suggested Tom to Jack, after a while.
The younger lad agreed willingly. In a few minutes they were on deck. Overhead the wind roared and shouted, but on deck, sheltered as it was by the wooded, rocky point, things were comparatively quiet. Ashore they could hear the wind humming and booming in the trees like the notes of a mighty pipe organ. Even where they stood the balsam-scented breath of the forest was borne to them. They inhaled it delightedly.
“Not unlike Maine,” decided Tom.
All at once, as they stood there enjoying the fresh air after the stuffy cabin, Jack gripped Tom’s arm tightly.
“Hark!” he whispered.
Above the hurly-burly of the wind and the clamor of the waters as they dashed against the shore, they could hear a voice upraised in what was, apparently, a tone of command. Then came a loud sound of metal rattling. The sound was unmistakable to any one who had any knowledge of seafaring.
“Some vessel’s dropped her anchor not far from us,” decided Tom.
“Right,” assented Jack, “and strain your eyes a bit and you’ll see that she’s a schooner.”
Peering into the darkness it was possible to make out, after a good deal of difficulty, the black outlines of two masts. They were barely perceptible, though, and if the boys had not heard the rattle of the anchor chain and thus known in which direction to look, they would not have made them out at all.
“Jack!” exclaimed Tom, as a sudden thought shot into his head, “that must be Bully Banjo’s schooner.”
“You think so?”
“Well, what other vessel would put in here? It’s true that we had to seek shelter, but a wind that would sink us wouldn’t bother a large vessel. This is a lonely place, and just the sort of harbor Simon Lake would seek.”
“But we are in here; surely he wouldn’t risk the chance of actual discovery?”
“But he doesn’t know we’re here. The sloop is painted black. It is unlikely that he sighted us beating in for shore this afternoon. We’d better tell the others.”
“That’s right,” agreed Jack, starting for the cabin door. But Tom laid a hand on his shoulder.
“Don’t open it,” he said. “They’d see the light.”
“Then how are we to tell them of what we have seen?”
“Tap on the cabin roof and then speak down the ventilator.”
“Good idea. We’ll do it.”
“Mr. Chillingworth,” whispered Tom, after his signal had been answered, and he had hastily warned the occupants of the cabin not to open the door, “there’s a big schooner come to anchor not far away. We thought you ought to know about it.”
The boys could hear an amazed exclamation come up the ventilator. The next instant the light was extinguished, and presently the cabin door was swiftly opened. Mr. Dacre, his friend, and Fu were soon standing by the boys on the deck, hearing their story. It was perfectly safe to talk in natural tones as the wind was blowing on shore, and it was doubtful if even had they shouted they could have been heard on the schooner.
On board the larger vessel, however, the case was different. The group on the yawl could now hear voices coming down the wind. Lights, too, began to bob about on the schooner’s decks. Evidently something was going forward.
“Our best plan is to listen and see what we can find out,” advised Mr. Chillingworth, after they had discussed the strange arrival of the schooner.
“Looks as if they had come in here for some definite purpose,” said Mr. Dacre.
“That’s right,” was the rejoinder, “and I can guess just what that purpose is. Lake’s schooner has not been round here for some time till the other day. I believe that she has just arrived from the island in the Pacific, where they say he picks up his Chinamen. They may be going to land a bunch to-night.”
“You think so?” asked Jack, his pulses beginning to beat.
“I don’t see what else they would have sought out this lonely spot for,” was the rejoinder. “Listen!”
A squeaking sound “cheep-cheep” came over the water from the schooner.
“They are getting ready to lower a boat,” cried Mr. Chillingworth. “I was right.”
“And they are going to turn a lot of Chinamen loose ashore?” gasped Tom.
“Well, they won’t turn them loose exactly,” rejoined Mr. Chillingworth, and if it had not been dark Tom would have noticed that he smiled. “Their method, so rumor has it, is to borrow some rancher’s team and wagon and drive the yellow men through the woods to a mining district to the north. Things are run pretty laxly there, and nobody asks questions so long as they get Chinese labor cheap.”
“But doesn’t every Chinaman who comes into the country have to have a certificate bearing his picture?” asked Tom. “Seems to me I’ve read that.”
“Perfectly true,” replied Mr. Chillingworth, “but it’s easy enough for men of Lake’s stripe to fake such certificates. After the men have worked at the mines a while, they leave there and mingle with their countrymen in the Chinatowns of any large Eastern or Western city. If any one asks questions, all they have to do is to show their certificates. As for the pictures, I guess one does for all. Every Chinaman looks pretty much alike.”
“That’s a fact,” agreed Mr. Dacre, “but all this must take a lot of money to engineer. Who provides the funds?”
“Ah, that’s a mystery. I’ve heard that a big syndicate is in it. It must pay tremendously. You see, the Chinamen will pay all the way from two hundred to a thousand dollars to be landed safely in the country. Lake, if he manages things right, can bring in as many as two hundred at a time. You see for yourself what that means – sixty thousand dollars at one fell swoop.”
“Phew!” whistled Mr. Dacre, “no wonder desperate men will take desperate chances for such rewards. But you mentioned an island from which Lake brings the men. Where is it?”
“That’s pure speculation,” rejoined Mr. Chillingworth. “The only reason for presuming that there is an island on which the Chinamen live till they can be run into the country is this: It is not probable that a schooner like Lake’s can run over to China. Her trips, in fact, rarely occupy more than a month or so. But as for the location of the island, I am as much in the dark as you are.”
“Hark!” cried Tom suddenly. “Isn’t that the sound of oars?”
“It is,” agreed Mr. Dacre, after listening a minute. “They’ve got a lantern in the boat, too. See, it is coming this way.”
Sure enough, they could now perceive a light coming over the water, evidently borne in the boat the splash of whose oars they had heard. On through the darkness came the moving light. Presently it stopped not far from the sloop. The occupants of the latter could see now that three men were in the little craft. One, a tall man with a sailor cap on his head, another, a short, thickset fellow, and the third man was undoubtedly a Chinaman. It was too dark to make out features, but the lantern light shone sufficiently on the occupants of the small boat for their general outlines to be apparent.
The Oriental member of the party wore loose flowing garb. On his head was a skull-cap surmounted by a button.
But after their first surprise our friends on the sloop turned their attention from the craft and its occupants to the freight with which the little boat was loaded. So far as they could make out, these were big canvas sacks about five feet or more in length. There seemed to be more than one of them. The boat rode very low in the water, apparently; whatever the freight was, it was fairly heavy.
As the oarsmen ceased their motions and the boat came to a stop, the men in her arose and the two white men laid hold of one of the bundles at either end. They lifted it, and before the party on the sloop had any idea of what they were going to do, they had swung their burden two or three times and then cast it out into the water. It sank with a sullen splash. As it did so, the Chinaman raised his hands above his head and seemed to be uttering some prayer, or invoking some deity.
But a sudden noise in their midst caused the party on the sloop to turn sharply.
For some inexplicable reason the mask-faced Fu was groveling on the deck. His lips were murmuring oriental words in a rapid sing-song. In his voice, and, above all, in his attitude, there was every indication of abject terror.
