The Motor Boat Club at Nantucket: or, The Mystery of the Dunstan Heir

“I’ll be snug and safe as anything,” declaredJed, smiling. He felt brave enough, in fact, untilthe dingey, going ashore for the second time, carried the last of his companions. Then allwas still, absolutely quiet, lonely and black.Jed, being highly imaginative, began to fancyhe saw figures darting from tree to tree on shore.The bushes had a mysterious look, for it wasso nearly dark that he could just make out theiroutlines.

Prentiss had said of himself that he was ahero, in theory, but that when danger faced himhe was likely to forget much of his courage.There are many such boys. They are not cowards, but are imaginative, have highly strungnervous systems, and are without real experienceof danger. When that experience doescome they often find themselves possessed offar more grit than they had believed.

Time slipped by. Nothing happened tojustify the state of Jed’s nerves. He was lonely, and wondering what the others were doing. Atlast, however, he heard something real. Prentisssprang up, stepping to the port rail to listen.The sound was unmistakable, that of a marineengine, though as yet the sound was far away.

“Can that be the filibustering steamer?” Jedwondered, thrilling.

Nearer and nearer came the sound. Prentisswas enough of a salt-water boy to know that thecraft must be a more than usually fast one.The strange craft was evidently keeping in closeto shore. At last, the keen-eyed boy grimlymade out a sea-going tug. Then she camenearer, and Jed knew that she was going to passwithin an eighth of a mile.

“It must be the filibustering steamer,”throbbed the boy. “She’s not a Governmentboat, yet she’s showing no lights. That boatmust be making for Sanderson’s pier!”

Then, all of a sudden, a single light did show.An electric searchlight blazed out, sweeping itsray along the coast. It was hardly a momentbefore that ray of light fell across the “Meteor”and remained there.

“Wow!” ejaculated Jed, in his excitement.“Now, those fellows can get in here before I cansignal any of our crowd back to the ‘Meteor.’”

Prentiss immediately found himself trembling.He sprang down into the engine room, intent onstarting the motor. In his excitable state ofmind it seemed to him that the motor had atleast a dozen drive wheels and no end of otherthings that had to be handled.

“And, oh, dear! I haven’t got the anchorup!” he groaned. He rushed up onto deck, only to find that the tug had started ahead again, and was bearing down directly upon him.Three men could be dimly made out forwardof the pilot house.

“They’re going to bear down upon this craftand sink her!” guessed Jed. “And, confound’em, they can do it before I can get up anchor, get the engine going, and get out of here!”

That it was the intention of those aboard thetug to ram the “Meteor,” and thus put her outof commission, seemed decidedly plain. Thetug was steaming slow but straight for the motorboat. Jed paused in a frenzy of uncertainty.

Then, all in a flash, a luminous idea came tohim. It looked almost crazy, yet it was the onlything that it seemed possible to do. Bendingdown the signal rocket box, Jed grasped a pieceof slow-match. This he lighted, his fingerstrembling. Then, as swiftly, he unfastenedthe lower hook of that rocket trough. He wasable, thus, to swivel the trough over the portrail.

“Now, we’ll see if the scheme’s any good,”quivered Jed, snatching up a rocket and restingit in the trough. Groping for his slow-match,he sighted along the stick of the rocket. Shaking,he applied the glowing end of the slow-matchto the rocket’s fuse. There was a sputtering, then a hiss.

Out over the waters shot the rocket, leavingbehind a fiery trail. It flew about three feetabove the top of the tug’s pilot house, droppinginto the ocean beyond.

“It was my trembling hand that spoiled myaim,” gasped Jed. “Now, another, and steady, old boy!”

Jed fitted the second rocket, applying thematch. Whizz! Smash!

“Ho, ho!” roared Jed, for that rocket, goingstraight and true, had smashed a light of glassin the tug’s pilot house. Bang! Being an explosiverocket, the thing blew into a thousandfragments inside that pilot house. A yell camefrom the man at the helm.

But Jed did not waste time looking or listening.He fitted another rocket, touching it offafter swift aim. That one whizzed between theheads of two of the three men out forward, andJed heard their rough words of alarm and anger.

“Wow!” ejaculated the boy. “I’m a wholeNavy! What?”

Another rocket he aimed at the three men.They scrambled in all directions. Still anotherrocket Prentiss drove through the pilot housewindows. Jed heard the engine room bell jinglefor the stop.

“I’ll give you plenty of it,” gritted Prentiss, thrusting a hand into the box and bringing forththis time a stout Roman candle – a fourteen-ballaffair.

Lighting and waving it, Jed was ready, at thepop of the first ball, to aim the affair at the tugboat. The missiles fell all about. Though Jeddid not know it, one of the hot, glowing ballsstruck Captain Jonas French squarely on theend of his bulb-like nose. He let out an Indian-likeyell, dropping the wheel. Another mancrawled in on his knees to take the skipper’splace, but he kept down below the wood-workof the front of the pilot house, steering by thelower spokes of the wheel.

The tug’s bell sounded for reversed speed, then for the go-ahead, as the craft swung herbow around. They were retreating, but Jed, chuckling aloud in his glee, sent three morerockets after the tug, just to show her peoplethat he had plenty of ammunition left. Then, when the tug was out of range, Jed stood up, gazing after her dim lines.

“Say, maybe there are a few Deweys left inAmerica,” he laughed aloud. “I wonder what’sthe answer?”

CHAPTER XXIII – SPYING ON THE FILIBUSTERS

Meanwhile, at the Sanderson farm, business was proceeding at a rate thatentitled the word to be spelled with avery large capital “B.”

Mr. Lawrence and his comrades, underCaptain Tom’s pilotage, were hidden where, despitethe darkness, they could get a very fair idea ofwhat was going on at the pier. Joe had ledWarren and the other local officers up wherethey could know what was going on behind thefarmhouse. Sanderson, Alvarez and all handsexcept Captain Jonas French, were working likeso many industrious ants. Two of the men weremoving cases out of the new shed onto the pier.The rest were bringing cases down to the pierfrom the farm outbuilding. All the cases werebeing piled at the end of the pier.

“That means they’re going to ship everythingto-night,” whispered Mr. Lawrence.

“When are you going to jump on them?”Halstead asked.

“Not until they get everything on their vessel, and get out on the water. If we showed ourselvesnow, and tried to arrest the crowd, whatcould we prove? Sanderson has a perfect rightto stack any kinds of merchandise on his pier.But when we overhaul a craft out on the water, loaded down with filibuster’s supplies, and thecaptain of that craft can show no regular papersfor such a cargo, then we have the crowdwhere we want them.”

It was a dull time waiting, but Inspector Lawrencewas right, as a man of his experiencewas quite likely to be. The time slipped on, with no open move on the part of the law’speople.

“I thought I saw a rocket up north, then,”whispered Tom, at last.

“Watch and see whether there’s another,”replied Lawrence, also in a whisper. But therocket Tom had seen was the last that Jed hadderisively shot after the retreating tug. Itwasn’t long, however, before the young motorboat skipper and the United States officers heardthe sound of the tug approaching. They laylow, but watched, quietly until the tug had dockedat the end of Sanderson’s pier.

“We’ll still have to use patience,” smiledMr. Lawrence, turning to Tom. “This is goingto be a watching game for some timeyet.”

By now the gang that had been bringing casesdown from the outbuilding all filed out onto thepier. The sounds of brisk but regular loadingfollowed. An hour of this work, monotonousfor the hidden watchers, followed, and thenanother hour. Neither Tom Halstead nor Mr.Lawrence, from their hiding place, could seethe cargo piles on the pier very distinctly.

“Halstead,” inquired the inspector, “do yousuppose you can safely wriggle nearer, and seehow far the loading has gone?”

“I know I can,” Tom answered. “I’ll goslowly about it, and make never a sound, or showmyself.”

After a few minutes, in fact, Tom got withinseven or eight feet of the pier. He had crawledover the ground, and now lay flat with his headbehind the roots of a tree.

From where he lay he could make out DonEmilio Alvarez standing talking with CaptainJonas French. The latter, with a swollen noseand a powder-burned cheek, was telling the gentlemanfrom Honduras all about Prentiss’s remarkableachievement.

“Oh, say, but that was grand of old Jed!”breathed Tom, his sides shaking with suppressedlaughter. “If Jed doesn’t get a Carnegie medalI’ll have my opinion of some folks!”

Don Emilio tossed away a half-burned cigar.The butt fell close by the tree roots that helpedconceal the head of the young motor boat skipper.Perhaps the little brown man startedslightly from something that the glowing tobaccoshowed him. At all events, he spoke in a whisperto Jonas French. The next instant bothleaped down from the shore end of the pier, rushing at the tree.

Tom Halstead sprang up, prepared to sprintfor it, but hardly had he started when he felthimself gripped savagely by French. One instantmore, and Tom Halstead found himselfbeing borne, despite his yells and furious, fightingstruggles, out along the pier.

“All aboard and cast off!” yelled JonasFrench, as he sped on over the boards. Thelast case of the cargo had just gone over thetug’s rail, and now two men sprang to cast offbow and stern hawsers. The engine room belljangled just as French and Alvarez, with theirstrenuous prisoner, sprang aboard.

Inspector Lawrence and his two comrades hadlost no time. They now came dashing fromconcealment, but they were too late. As theyarrived at the end of the pier the tug was ahundred yards on her way.

At the starboard rail stood two seamen, holdingTom as in a vise. Behind the young motorboat skipper stood Don Emilio Alvarez, wavinga taunting hand at the officers. Jonas Frenchhad gone forward to take command of the tug.

The seamen, powerful, swarthy fellows wholooked like Portuguese, held Tom at the rail untilthe tug was half a mile from shore.

“Now, you can let go of him, my men,” noddedAlvarez, “but watch the young man.”

“Mr. Captain, how would you like to strollaft and look at a nice surprise we may serveout to your friends?” The Honduran’s tonewas mocking, bantering, but Tom Halstead, filled with curiosity, accepted the invitation.Alvarez led the way, the two seamen going behindthe boy.

On the deck aft stood something of considerablesize, covered by a canvas tarpaulin.