The Motor Boat Club and The Wireless: or, the Dot, Dash and Dare Cruise

“That fellow Hilton, so anxious to get ashore, may be the very chap who struck down Mr. Clodis!”

“The thought had just come to me,” admitted Joe.

“Yes! You know, Mr. Seaton hinted that the ‘accident’ might have been an attempt to kill.”

Captain and engineer of the “Restless” stared disconcertedly at each other.

“Now, why did I have to go and make such a fearful stumble as that?” groaned Tom.

“You didn’t, any more than I did,” Joe tried to console him.

“We should, at least, have kept Hilton aboard until Mr. Seaton had had a chance to look him over.”

“I could send a wireless to the Beaufort police to grab Hilton on landing,” suggested Joe, doubtfully, but Tom Halstead shook his head energetically.

“No; the Beaufort police wouldn’t do that on our say-so, Joe. And, even if they did, we might get ourselves into a lot of trouble.”

The “Restless” kept smoothly, swiftly on her way, bounding over the low, gentle swell of the calm ocean. Tom shivered whenever he thought of the possibility of the motors becoming cranky. With such important human freight aboard any mishap to the machinery would be extremely serious.

“Joe,” called Tom, at last, as the yacht came in sight of Lonely Island, “there’s a tug at our dock.”

Dawson came on deck, taking the marine glass from his chum’s hand.

“I guess Mr. Seaton has been hustling, then. He couldn’t have come from Beaufort on the tug, after all the trouble of rounding up doctors. He must have come down the shore in an automobile, and then engaged the tug near the island.”

As the “Restless” went closer, the tug, with two short toots of its whistle, moved out from the dock. Powell Seaton, in broad-brimmed hat and blue serge, waved his hand vigorously at the boys. With him stood three men, presumably surgeons. Captain Tom Halstead sounded three short blasts of the auto-whistle to signal the success of his errand, while Joe swung his uniform cap over his head.

“Get down to your engines, Joe,” called Captain Tom. “I’m going to make a swift landing that will be in keeping with Mr. Seaton’s impatience.”

Up to within nearly two hundred yards of the dock the “Restless” dashed in at full speed. Then signaling for half speed, next for the stop, and finally for the reverse, Captain Tom swung the yacht in almost a semi-circle, running up with bare headway so that the boat lay in gently against the string-piece. In that instant Tom, leaving the wheel, bounded up onto the dock, bow hawser in hand, and made the loop fast over the snubbing post. In the same instant Joe Dawson, cat-footed, raced aft, next leaping ashore with the stern hawser.

“Jove, but that was a beautiful bit of boat-handling – a superb piece of seamanship!” muttered one of the surgeons, admiringly.

Powell Seaton, however, stopped to hear none of this. He gripped Tom by the arm, demanding hoarsely:

“You brought Clodis ashore? How is he? Where?”

“Still unconscious, sir, and the ship’s doctor offered no hope. You will find your friend in the port stateroom, sir.”

Signing to the surgeons to accompany him, Mr. Seaton vanished aft, the medical men with him. Ten minutes passed before Hank came up, alone.

“What do the doctors say, Hank?” demanded Tom, instantly.

“One chance in about a million,” replied Hank, in a very subdued voice – for him.

Five minutes later Mr. Seaton, hat in hand, also came up on deck.

“Mr. Seaton,” murmured Tom, eagerly, “I’ve been waiting for you. I – we’ve something to tell you.” Then the young skipper detailed the affair of taking Arthur Hilton from the “Constant” and transferring him to the Beaufort-bound schooner.

“Describe the fellow!” commanded Powell Seaton, suddenly, hoarsely.

Captain Tom did so.

“Arthur Hilton he called himself, did he?” cried Mr. Seaton, in a rage. “Anson Dalton is the scoundrel’s real name!”

“Who is he, sir?” Tom asked, anxiously.

“Who is Anson Dalton?” cried Mr. Seaton, his voice sounding as though he were choking. “Who, but the scoundrel who has engineered this whole desperate plot against me! The dastard who struck down Allan Clodis! The knave who has striven for the badge of Cain!”

CHAPTER III

INVISIBLE HANDS AT THE WIRELESS

In a rear bedroom, the furthest apartment from the wireless room of the bungalow, Allan Clodis, barely alive, was placed when they bore him up from the boat. Then the three surgeons, retaining only Hank Butts, drove the others from the room.

“Back to the wireless!” breathed Seaton, tensely. “Dawson, get Beaufort on the jump.”

“I have the Beaufort operator,” reported Joe, after a few moments.

“Then rush this message, and ask the operator to get it in the hands of the chief of police without an instant’s loss of time,” directed Mr. Seaton, speaking in jerky haste.

The message described Anson Dalton, also the black schooner on which he had last been seen. The police chief was asked to arrest Dalton on sight, on the authority of Powell Seaton, and hold him for the United States authorities, for an attempt at homicide on an American ship on the high seas.

Within ten minutes back came the reply from Beaufort to this effect:

“I have men out watching for the schooner. Man Dalton will be arrested as you request. Will notify you.”

“Good!” cried Mr. Seaton, rubbing his hands vengefully. “Oh, Dalton, you scoundrel, you can’t escape us now, for long! You knew that, if you continued down the coast, there was danger that a United States revenue cutter would intercept the ship and take you off. At best, you knew you would be arrested at Rio Janeiro, if I suspected you, as I was bound to do. So you tried to steal ashore here, to be swallowed up in the mazes of this broad country at least an hour or two ahead of pursuit. And, but for the wireless spark that leaps through space, you could have done so. But we shall have you now.”

“Unless–” began Tom Halstead, hintingly, then paused.

“Unless – what?” insisted Mr. Seaton.

“Suppose Dalton is shrewd enough to pay the captain of the schooner to land him at some other point, where there is neither a policeman nor a telegraph station?”

Seaton made a noise that sounded as though he were grinding his teeth. Then he picked up a pencil, writing furiously.

“Send this to the police chief at Beaufort,” he ordered. Joe Dawson’s fingers made the sending-key sing. The message was one warning the police chief that Dalton might attempt to land at some point outside of Beaufort, and asking him to cover all near points along the coast. Mr. Seaton offered to make good any expense that this would entail.

Once more, in a few minutes, the answer was at hand.

“Chief of police at Beaufort says,” Joe translated the dots and dashes, “that his authority does not extend beyond the city limits.”

Again Mr. Seaton began to show signs of fury. Then, as though to force self-control, he trod softly out of the room, going toward the door of the sick-room, where Hank Butts stood guard.

“No news, sir; no change,” Hank reported, in an undertone.

“I’m afraid Mr. Seaton is pretty angry with us,” said Tom Halstead, gravely, “for allowing Hilton – Dalton, I mean – to get away from us.”