Tom Fairfield at Sea: or, The Wreck of the Silver Star

There was a clanging of bells in the engine room, as the propeller was reversed.

“Hold tight, Jackie!” cried Tom, as he tried to get the little fellow back over the rail. “I’ll help you. Hold tight!”

But the little boy was too frightened to aid himself and he let go. But now our hero had a better hold and he clung on desperately, until others came to his assistance, and then both were helped to a place of safety. Tom had gotten pretty wet, but this he did not mind.

“Oh, Jackie! Jackie, my boy!” cried Mr. Case, hugging the little form to him, and then, still clasping his son, the man held out his hand to Tom.

“I – I can’t thank you now,” he said brokenly, “but I may be able to – sometime.”

The accident broke up the pleasant little party on deck, and Tom hurried below to change to dry garments. As he passed the stateroom of the mysterious man our hero saw that one of the stewards was speaking through the partly-opened door to Mr. Trendell.

“It’s all over now,” the steward was saying. “A little boy almost fell overboard, and Tom Fairfield went after him.”

“Was either recovered? Was Tom Fairfield drowned?” asked the voice of the man in the stateroom.

“No, sir. They were both saved. Thank you!” This last obviously in response to a tip handed out. The door was closed and Tom passed on.

“Queer,” he mused, as he reached his stateroom, “very queer that he should want to know if I was drowned.”

Neither our hero nor little Jackie was any the worse off the next morning for the accident. Tom’s heroism was the talk of the ship.

“I think the big fish, whatever it was, that caused all the trouble, must have brought the change of weather,” said Mrs. Pendleton to Tom that afternoon. “It isn’t as nice as it was.”

“Oh, we can’t always have good weather,” spoke Tom. The day was one of lowering clouds, and as our hero, a little later, went up to the pilot house, he saw Captain Steerit again studying the barometer.

“Anything wrong?” inquired Tom.

“She’s falling again,” was the answer. “I don’t like it. I think we’re in for a storm.”

The wind began to rise about an hour after that, and the clouds appeared lower than ever, some of them seeming fairly to touch the distant waves. The rigging hummed and twanged like the strings of a harp. Sailors were hurrying about, making everything snug below and aloft.

“Ha! What’s that?” suddenly asked the captain, as the lookout in the bows cried out a warning. The man repeated what he had said, but Tom could not catch it.

“Look, look, Tom my lad, if you want to see a strange sight!” said the commander, taking hold of Tom’s arm, and directing his gaze off to the left. “Did you ever see the like before?”

Our hero looked and saw, rising from the ocean, a dark mass of water, twisted into the shape of a funnel, with the upper end whipping about and twisting like a snake. At the same moment, from a black and threatening cloud above, a similar funnel-shaped mass seemed to drop, only the point of it was toward the point in the cone of water.

Suddenly the two met, forming a black pillar, and there was a loud roaring sound.

“What is it?” cried Tom, but, even as he asked he knew what the captain would say.

“Waterspout! A waterspout, and a big one, too!”

The attention of everyone on board had been called to the strange and threatening phenomenon by this time, and they all watched it anxiously.

“A waterspout,” murmured Tom. “I’ve often heard about them, but I never saw one before. What will it do?”

“Break when the whirlwind that caused it dies out,” was the answer, “but – ” The captain suddenly ceased speaking. Then he cried:

“It’s headed right this way! The waterspout is coming toward us!”

CHAPTER VI

SEEN IN THE GLASS

Instantly there was a commotion all through the Silver Star. The captain’s alarming words had frightened the sailors as well as the passengers. As for Tom, he stood in fascinated wonder on the bridge, watching the approaching waterspout.

And that it was approaching, and rapidly too, could not be doubted. It was sweeping onward with a whirling motion, straight for the ship, and there was a low, moaning and humming sound to the wind that had created it, which did not add to the pleasure of the spectacle.

“Is there any danger?” asked Tom.

“There is if it hits us,” was the captain’s grim answer. “But I’m not going to let that happen, if I can help it. I’ll go ahead full speed and try to get out of the way. It’s only in a sailing ship, where it’s hard to change the course against a perverse wind, that there is really any great danger, though I have heard of steamers being hit.”

“Oh, Captain Steerit!” cried a woman passenger from the deck below. “Will we be wrecked?”

“Not if I can help it,” was his answer. “There is comparatively no danger. I’ll pass the spout to one side.”

“Then I’m going to try for a picture!” exclaimed Tom. “Will it last long enough for me to get my camera?” he asked, pausing on his way down.

“It will if you hurry,” answered the commander. “And I may be able to give you a chance to get a rare view.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean I’m going to try to break that spout with a cannon shot. I’ve read of such things being done, but I never tried it. I’ve got a gun on board, for saluting some of the owners at the islands where I trade, and I’ll have my gunner try a shot at it.”

“Great!” cried Tom. “If I can get a view of the spout, as the cannon ball hits it, that will be a rare one.”

He hurried below for his camera, while the captain gave his order about the cannon, and the crew ran the gun out on the bow.

When Tom came up from his stateroom he saw that the spout was much nearer. But the course of the Silver Star had been so changed that she was in comparatively no danger of being struck, unless the waterspout suddenly shifted.

“All ready now with that gun!” cried the captain.

“All ready! Aye, aye, sir!” came the answer.

Tom was taking several views of the waterspout as it was whirling along, and some of the other passengers, grown bolder as they saw that there was no danger, were doing the same.

“Ready to snap her, Tom?” asked the commander.

“Yes, sir,” answered our hero.

“Then here she goes! Fire!”

There was a puff of white smoke, a dull flame, and a report that seemed to jar the whole ship. Tom had a glimpse of something black bounding over the waves. It was the round shot from the old-fashioned cannon, and had no great speed, as cannon balls go.

“Get ready, Tom!” called the captain.

Tom focused his camera on the whirling waterspout, and waited the right moment to push the shutter lever.