The Phantom Yacht

“The shoals’ll come up, sudden-like, clost to the top of the water, most any time now,” Gib said, “so keep watchin’ ahead. If you see a place whar the color’s different, sort o’ shallow lookin’, jest sing out an’ I’ll pull away.”

Nann, thrilling with the excitement of a new adventure, looked over the side of the punt and into water so deep and dark green that it seemed bottomless, but all at once they sailed right over a sharp-pointed rock. Then another appeared, and another.

“Gib!” the girl’s cry was startled, “you’d better stop sailing now and take the oars, slowly, for if we hit a rock, way out here, and capsize, pray, who would there be to save us?”

Nann shuddered as she gazed ahead at the gray, grim island. A flock of long-legged, long-beaked and altogether ungainly looking seabirds arose from the rocks with shrill, unearthly screams, and, after circling overhead for a moment they landed a safe distance away. There was no other sign of life.

Gibralter let the sail flap at the girl’s suggestion and began to row slowly along on the sheltered side of the island.

“Hark!” Nann said, lifting one hand. “Just hear how the surf is pounding on the outer coast. Don’t go too far, Gib; see how the water swirls around the rocks where they jut out into the sea.”

As he rowed slowly along, the boy kept a keen-eyed watch along the shore. “Thar’d ought to be a place whar a body could land safely,” he said at last. Then added excitedly as he pointed: “Look’et; thar’s a big flat shoal that goes way up to the island, an’ I’m sure as anything this here punt could slide right up over it an’ never touch bottom. Are ye game to try it, Miss Nann? Say, are ye?”

The girl looked at the wide, flat shoal that was about two feet under water and which was evidently connected with the island. Then she looked at the eager face of the boy. “I dare, if you dare,” she said with a bright smile.

Gibralter managed to row the punt boat within a length of the island over the submerged shoal, and then it stuck.

“Well,” Nann remarked, “I suppose we will have to stay here until the rising tide lifts us off.”

“Nary a bit of it,” the boy replied as he stripped off his shoes and stockings. This done he stepped over the side of the boat, which, lightened of his weight, again floated.

Taking the rope at the bow, the lad pulled and tugged until the punt was high and dry, then Nann leaped out. Standing on a rock, she shaded her eyes and gazed back across the three miles of sparkling blue waters. She could see the eight cottages in a row on the sandy shore. How strange it seemed to be looking at them from the island.

“We mustn’t stay long, Gib,” she said to the lad who was examining the rocks with interest. “When the tide rises the waves will be higher and that punt boat of yours may not be very seaworthy.”

“Thar’s nothin’ onusual on this here side,” the boy soon reported. “’Twon’t take long to climb up top and see what’s on the other side.” As he spoke, he began to climb over the rocks, holding out his hand to assist the sure-footed girl in the ascent.

“There doesn’t seem to be a green thing growing anywhere,” Nann remarked as she looked about curiously, “even in the crevices there is nothing but a silvery gray moss.” Then she inquired, “Are there any serpents on this island, Gib?”

The boy shook his head. “Never heard tell of anything hereabouts, ’cept just an octopus. Pa says onct a fisherman’s boat was pulled under by one of them critters with a lot of arms sort o’ like snakes.”

Nann stood still and stared at the boy. “Gibralter Strait,” she cried, “if I thought there was one of those terrible sea-serpents about here, I’d go right home this very instant. Why, I’d rather meet a dozen ghosts than one octopus.”

“I guess ’twant nothin’ but a story,” the boy said, sorry that he had happened to mention it. “Guess likely that was all.” Then, as they had reached the top of the rocks that were piled high, they stood for a moment side by side gazing down to the rugged shore far below.

The boy suddenly caught the girl’s arm. “Look! Look!” he cried. “That’s what I was wantin’ to find.” He pointed toward a whitening skeleton of a boat that was high on the rocks well out of reach of the surf and about two hundred feet to the left of where they were standing. “Like as not that wreck’s been thar nigh unto ten year, shouldn’t you say? An’ if so, why mightn’t it be ‘The Phantom Yacht’ as well as any other? I should think it might, shouldn’t you, Miss Nann?”

“I suppose so,” the girl faltered. “But oh, how I do hope that it isn’t. I want to believe that the mother with her boy and girl are safe, somewhere.” Then pleadingly, “Don’t you think we’d better start for home now, Gib? I do want to get away before the tide turns, and even if that old skeleton should be ‘The Phantom Yacht,’ there would be no way for us to prove it. You never did know the real name of the boat, did you?”

“No.” the boy confessed, “I never did. Sort o’ got to thinkin’ ‘Phantom Yacht’ was its name, but like’s not ’twasn’t.”

The bleached skeleton of the boat was soon reached and the lad, leaving Nann standing on a broad flat rock, scrambled down nearer and began searching for something that might identify it as the craft which, many years before, had sailed, white and graceful, to and fro in the sheltered waters of the bay, and which had been called “The Phantom Yacht.”

Half an hour passed, but search as he might, the disappointed boy found nothing that could identify the boat. The storms of many winters had stripped it, leaving but a whitened skeleton and, before long, even that would be broken up and washed on the shore where the cottages were, to be gathered and burned as driftwood.

It was with real regret that Gibralter at last left the wrecked boat and returned to the side of the girl. He found her gazing into the swirling green waters beyond the rocks as though she were fascinated.

“What ye lookin’ at, Miss Nann?” he inquired.

She turned toward him, wide-eyed. “Gib,” she said, “I thought I saw that octopus you were telling about. Look, there it is again! See it stretching out a long brown arm.”

The boy laughed heartily. “That thar’s sea weeds, Miss Nann,” he chuckled, “one o’ the long streamer kind.” Then he added, more seriously, “We’d better scud ’long. ’Pears like the tide is turnin’.” Then his optimistic self once again, “All the better if it has turned. It’ll take us to Siquaw Point a scootin’.”

When they reached the ridge of the island, the boy looked regretfully back at the grim skeleton. “D’ye know, Miss Nann,” he remarked, “I’m sure sartin that we’re leavin’ without findin’ a clue that’s hidin’ thar waitin’ to be found. I’m sure sartin we are.”

It was a habit with the boy to repeat, perhaps for the sake of emphasis.

“Wall,” Nann declared, “to be real honest, Gib, I’d heaps rather be standing on that sandy stretch of beach over there where the cottages are than I would to find any clue that the old skeleton may be concealing.” Then she laughed, as she accepted his proffered assistance to descend the rocks. “I don’t know why, but I feel as though something skeery is about to happen. Maybe I’m more imaginative on water than I am on land.”

They slid and scrambled down the rocks and were nearing the bottom when an ejaculation of mingled astonishment and dismay escaped from the boy.

“What is it, Gib?” the girl asked anxiously. “Has the skeery something happened already?”

“The punt. ’Taint thar. The tide rose sooner’n I was countin’ on and like’s not that boat o’ mine is sailin’ out to sea.”

For one panicky moment the girl stood very still, her hand pressed on her heart. Then she recalled something that her father once had said: “When danger threatens, keep a clear head. That will do more than anything else to avert trouble.”

The boy, shading his eyes, was searching for the escaped punt far out on the shining waters, but Nann, looking about her, made a discovery. Then she laughed gleefully. The boy turned toward her in astonishment. Then, being very quick witted, he too understood. “You don’ need to tell me,” he said, “I’m on! We changed our location, so to speak, when we went to look at the wreck, and that fetched us down at a different place on this here side.”

Nann nodded. “I do believe that we’ll find the punt beyond the rocks yonder,” she hazarded. And they did. Ten minutes later the boy had pushed the boat safely over the submerged shoal. The rising tide carried them swiftly out of danger of the hidden rocks. Although Nann said nothing, she kept intently gazing into the dark green water. She would far rather meet any number of ghosts on land, she assured herself, than even catch a glimpse of one of those dreadful sea monsters.

It was nearly one o’clock when Dories, who was standing on the porch of the cabin, saw the flat-bottomed boat returning, and she ran down to the shore to meet her friend.

“Did you find a clue?” she called as Nan leaped ashore.

“I don’t believe so,” was the merry response. “We found an old whitening skeleton of some ill-fated boat, but I’m not going to believe it is the Phantom Yacht. Not yet, anyway.” Then Nann turned to call to the boy who was pushing his punt away from the rocks, “See you tomorrow, Gib, if you come this way. Thank you for taking me sailing.”

As soon as the girls had turned back toward the cottage, Dories exclaimed, “Nann, I believe that I have thought of a splendid way to trap the ghost tonight, but I’m not going to tell you until just before we go to bed.”

CHAPTER XIII

BELLING THE GHOST

There was a sharp, cold wind that afternoon and so Nann suggested that they make a big fire on the hearth in the living room and write letters. Miss Moore had told them that she wished to be left alone.

“We have used up nearly all of the wood in the shed,” Nann said as she brought in an armful.

“There’s lots of driftwood on the shore. Let’s gather some tomorrow,” Dories suggested as she made herself comfortable in a deep, easy willow chair near the jolly blaze which Nann had started. “Now I’m going to write the newsiest kind of a letter to mother and brother. I suppose you’ll write to your father.”

Nann nodded as she seated herself on the other side of the fireplace, pencil and pad in readiness. For a few moments they scribbled, then Dories glanced up to remark with a half shudder, “Do hear that mournful wind whistling down the chimney, and here comes the fog drifting in so early. If it weren’t for the fire, this would be a gloomy afternoon.”

Again they wrote for a time, then Dories glanced up to find Nann gazing thoughtfully into the fire. “A penny for your thoughts,” she called.

Nann smiled brightly. “They were rather a jumble. I was wondering if, by any chance, you and I would ever meet the wee girl and the handsome little boy who sailed away on the Phantom Yacht; then, too, I was wondering who was playing a practical joke on us.”

“Meaning what?”

“Why the notes, of course.” Nann folded her finished letter, addressed the envelope and after stamping it, she glanced up to ask, “Why not tell me now, how you intend to trap the joker.”