The Boy Pilot of the Lakes: or, Nat Morton's Perils

But if there were dirt and squalor all about, Mrs. Miller did her best to keep her apartment clean. So though the way up to it was by rather dirty stairs, the rooms were neat and comfortable.

"Well, Nat, you're home early, aren't you?" asked the woman, who, with her husband, had befriended the orphan lad.

"Yes, Mrs. Miller."

"I suppose you couldn't get any work?"

"Oh, yes, I got some."

"What's the matter, then? Don't you feel well?"

She could not understand any one coming away so early from a place where there was work, for work, to the poor, means life itself.

"Oh, I did so well I thought I'd take a vacation," and Nat related the incident of the day.

The boy's liking for the water seemed to have been born in him. Soon after his mother had died his father placed him in the care of a family in an inland city. The child seemed to pine away, and an old woman suggested he might want to be near the water, as his father had followed all his life a calling that kept him aboard boats. Though he did not believe much in that theory, Mr. Morton finally consented to place his son to board in Chicago. Nat at once picked up and became a strong, healthy lad.

As he grew older his father took him on short trips with him, so Nat grew to know and love the Great Lakes, as a sailor learns to know and love the ocean.

Soon Nat began asking questions about ships and how they were sailed. His father was a good instructor, and between his terms at school Nat learned much about navigation in an amateur sort of way.

Best of all he loved to stand in the pilot-house, where he was admitted because many navigators knew and liked Mr. Morton. There the boy learned something of the mysteries of steering a boat by the compass and by the lights on shore. He learned navigating terms, and, on one or two occasions, was even allowed to take the spokes of the great wheel in his own small hands.

In this way Nat gained a good practical knowledge of boats. Then came the sad day when he received the news of the death of his father. Though up to that time he had lived in comparative comfort, he now found himself very poor.

For though, as he told John Scanlon, his father had said something about financial matters being better after the delivery of the big load that was on the lumber barge on which he met his death, the boy was too young to understand it.

All he knew was that he had to leave his pleasant boarding place and go to live with a poor family – the Millers – who took compassion on the homeless lad.

Mr. Miller had made an effort to see if Mr. Morton had not left some little money, but his investigation resulted in nothing.

For about two years Nat had lived with the Millers, doing what odd jobs he could find. His liking for the water kept him near the lake, and he had never given up his early ambition to become a pilot some day, though that time seemed very far off.

Every chance Nat got he went aboard the steamers that tied up at the river wharves. In this way he got to know many captains and officers. Some were kind to him and allowed him the run of their ships while at dock. Others were surly, and ordered the boy off.

In this way he became quite a familiar figure about the lake front, and was more or less known to those who had business there.

When Mr. Miller came home the night of Nat's adventure he congratulated the lad on what he had done in the matter of saving the rowboat.

"And I got well paid for it," added Nat as he finished his story and showed the five-dollar bill. "There, Mrs. Miller, we'll have a good dinner Sunday."

"But I can't take your money, Nat," objected the woman.

"Of course you will," he insisted. "That's what it's for. I owe you a lot of back board, anyhow. I didn't get hardly any work last week."

"I hope business will be better next week," said Mr. Miller. "I didn't earn much myself these last few days."

There was little to do at the pier the next day, and the following day quite a severe storm swept over the lake. The boats were late getting to the docks, and the longshoremen and freight handlers had to labor far into the night.

"I don't believe I'll be able to get home to supper, Nat," said Mr. Miller to the lad as they were working near each other on the dock late in the afternoon. "Could you spare time to go up and tell my wife?"

"Sure. I'm almost done with taking out the light stuff. I'll go in about half an hour. Shall I bring you back some lunch?"

"Yes, that would be a good idea, and then I'll not have to stop, and I can earn more."

As Nat was about to leave, the freight agent called to him:

"Where you going, Nat?"

"Home to get some supper for Mr. Miller."

"All right. See me when you come back. I have an errand for you, and I'll give you a quarter if you do it."

"Sure I will. What is it?"

"I want to send a message and some papers to a firm uptown. It's about some freight they're expecting, and the office is keeping open late on account of it. Now hurry home and come back, and I'll have the message ready for you."

Nat was soon back at the pier, with a lunch for Mr. Miller. Then, with the note and papers which the freight agent had ready for him, he started off uptown.

As he was on his way back from the errand, he walked slowly along the water front. He decided he would call at the pier and see if he could help Mr. Miller, so that his benefactor might get through earlier.

Nat reached a wharf some distance away from the one where he had been employed during the day. It seemed to be deserted, though there was a large vessel tied up on one side of it, and two barges on the other.

"I'd like to be a pilot on that big steamer," thought Nat as he contemplated the craft in the glare of an electric light. "That would be a fine job. Well, maybe I'll be on one like her some day."

He was about to walk on, when suddenly the stillness of the night was broken by a cry. It was a shout, and it seemed to come from near the big freight barges.

"Help! help!" cried the voice. "I'm drowning! I'm in the water and I can't get out! Help! help!"

CHAPTER III

NAT'S BRAVE RESCUE

"Somebody must have fallen overboard from one of the barges," thought Nat, for he could now easily determine that the cry came from the side of the dock where the two big freight carriers were tied. "Why doesn't some one there help him?"

But though he thus wondered, he did not hesitate over what to do. He ran out on the pier, and seeing a gangplank leading to one barge, he sprinted up it. The cries continued.

"I'm coming!" the boy shouted. "I'll help you! Where are you?"

"Down between the two barges! I can't get out!" cried a man's voice. "Hurry! help!"

The voice ended in a gurgle.

"He's gone down under water!" exclaimed Nat. "Man overboard!" he loudly cried, thinking some one on the dock or aboard the vessels might hear him and come to help aid in rescuing the imperiled one. But there came no answer. The pier seemed to be deserted.

Nat reached the deck of the first barge and rushed across it to the farthermost rail. He tried to peer down into the black space between the two freight boats, but he could see nothing.

"Where are you?" he called again.