Dave Fearless and the Cave of Mystery: or, Adrift on the Pacific

The pilot ran the nose of the craft well into the sand, shut off the power, and leaped ashore.

Dave saw him take up a basket and watched him depart for the hut. As soon as some trees shut him out from view Dave leaped on board of the launch.

A momentary inspection of the operating lever and steering gear told Dave that he could easily navigate the boat.

"I must lose no time," he thought. "My only chance of getting away with Schmitt-Schmitt is in taking the launch."

Dave forthwith dragged his unconscious captive to the launch. It was no easy task to get that bulky individual aboard. Dave accomplished it, however, and then paused to catch his breath and wipe the perspiration from his face.

"Hi! hi! hi!"

A ringing yell, or rather three of them, uttered in rapid and startling succession, made Dave turn with a shock.

Looking down the beach, he saw the pilot running towards him at full speed. The latter had evidently visited the hut, had found it vacated, and coming out to look for his missing friend, had discovered the launch in the hands of a stranger.

Dave made no reply. He sprang to the little lever, reversing it, and the launch slid promptly back into the water. Swinging the steering gear south, Dave turned on full power.

"Stop. I'll shoot-stop! stop!" panted the pilot, gaining on Dave with prodigious bounds of speed.

Dave kept his hand on the lever, his eyes fixed ahead. Suddenly-

Bang-ping! a shot whistled past his ear. Dave crouched and darted a quick glance backward. The pilot, coming to a standstill, was firing at him from a revolver.

Dave saw a point of refuge ahead. This was a broken irregular wooded stretch, well-nigh impassable on foot. As a second shot sounded out, Dave curved around this point of land.

He was now out of view of the pilot, who would find great difficulty in crossing the stretch lying between them, as it was marshy in spots. Dave lined the shore farther on, feeling pretty proud of the success of his single-handed enterprise.

"Why," he mused, "we have the game in our own hands completely now. I wonder what father and Captain Broadbeam will say to all this. Of course they won't fancy such a guest as Schmitt-Schmitt, but they must see how holding him a harmless captive helps our plans."

Dave made a sweep with the launch to edge the rounding end of the island. Here it narrowed to about two hundred feet. It would now be a straight bolt past the same islets to where the Swallow was.

"Won't do-the gunboat, sure as shingles!" spoke Dave suddenly.

Almost directly in his course, and bearing down upon him, was the ironclad. In that clear moonlight everything was plain as in daylight. Dave could see the people on board the gunboat, and they could see him-without doubt.

In fact, someone in uniform leaned over the bow of the ironclad in his direction. Dave caught an indistinct hail. He paid no attention to it.

He acted with the precipitancy of a school fugitive running away from a truant officer. He saw just one chance to evade an unpleasant overhauling by the ironclad, and took it.

This was to instantly steer to the north and shoot down the narrow neck of water lying between the wooded island and the nearest sand island.

Dave knew that this channel must be quite shallow. He doubted if the cumbersome iron-clad could navigate it. Even if it tried to, it would be some minutes before its crew could swing around into position to make the chase.

The launch took the channel like an arrow. Dave's spirits rose high, notwithstanding some loud and quite peremptory hails from the direction of the gunboat.

"Better than before," soliloquized Dave. "I can swing around the sandbars directly to the anchorage of the Swallow."

Glancing back, Dave saw that the gunboat did not intend to follow the course he had taken. That craft had stopped and put about.

"They must suspect that something's not exactly right," calculated Dave. "The mischief-that was close. Ouch! I'm hit."

Dave went keeling over from the bow seat. Very suddenly, from some bushes on the wooded island, there were two sharp flashes and reports. One bullet whizzed past his head, the second plowed a furrow across his forearm. It was not deep, but the wound bled, and the surprise and shock sent Dave over backwards.

The worst of it was that he jerked the lever, and this, turning the launch, sent its nose directly into shore, and there the boat stuck, vibrating with the impact of the still working machinery. The pilot instantly ran from cover towards the boat, flourishing the weapon in his hand. He had crossed the island, it seemed, to head off the launch, and it looked as though Dave was doomed to disaster in his present enterprise.

Dave scrambled to get back to the lever, and reverse the launch. As he did so his hand touched something lying upon straps at the side of the seat pit.

It was a rifle. Dave seized it, jerked it and its fastenings free, and extended it directly at the running figure ashore.

"Get back," he shouted. "Drop that pistol, Mr. Pilot, or there will be trouble."

The pilot, with a howl of rage, halted short. He flung the revolver down. Dave guessed that it was now empty.

As Dave touched the lever and got out into the channel again, he saw the pilot running back along the beach. He was headed for the end of the island in the direction of the ironclad, and yelling out some information to those aboard at the top of his bellowing voice.

"Now for a spurt," said Dave.

The channel was about a mile long. Dave came to its end in fine spirits. It was a clear run now past the two outer sand islands, and a half-mile turn would bring him to the Swallow.

He proceeded more leisurely now, for it did not seem possible that the ironclad could make the opposite circuit in time to head him off. Where the sand hills dropped, however, Dave had a view across the two next islands.

"They are after me," he exclaimed. "The pilot has advised them of the real state of affairs, and it's a sharp run. Full power-go!"

Dave had made out the gunboat whizzing down the channel between the two outer sand islands. She was forcing full speed. It was a question whether the gunboat would not emerge first into the open sea and block his course.

Dave put on power that made the little launch strain and quiver from stem to stern. He was terribly excited and anxious. His breath came in quick jerks, his heart beat fast.

"Close shave," he panted, "but I've made it."

Two hundred feet down the channel was the gunboat, as Dave crossed her outlet. The ironclad swung out after him not one minute later.

The launch fairly skimmed the water. The ironclad loomed portentously near, but Dave felt that, no mishap occurring, he would win the race.

"They've got me, I guess," he gasped a second later.

A flash, a loud boom, and a terrific concussion plunged Dave into a condition of extreme confusion and uncertainty.

The ironclad had fired a shot. It had struck the stern of the launch, splintering it clear open. A great shower of water deluged Dave and his insensible captive.

Dave regarded the damage done with grave dismay-the stern had sunk and the launch was now on a slant.

In fact, the rear portion of the boat was under water to the rail.

Only by keeping up power could the launch be prevented from filling and going down. Dave never let go his grasp on the lever. He held firmly to the last notch in the indicator.

As he turned the end of the last sand island, the maneuver made the launch wabble. Just here a second gun was fired from the ironclad. The shot went far wide of its intended mark, but a vital alarm urged Dave to change his course.

The launch went sideways, and a sudden inrush of water sunk her to the middle. Dave headed for shore. There the launch struck, a wreck.

Down the shore lay the Swallow. Active lights were bobbing about her deck, so Dave knew that the crew had been aroused by the firing at sea.

His first thought was to get Schmitt-Schmitt out of the half-submerged launch. He dragged his captive to the beach, then he took a look at the gunboat.

"Why," exclaimed Dave, in mingled astonishment and satisfaction, "she's grounded."

Apparently the ironclad had struck some treacherous sandbar over which the light swift launch had glided in safety. Loud orders, quick bells, and whistles made a small babel aboard the craft in distress.

Dave glanced down calculatingly at his helpless captive. He must get him to the Swallow. But how?

The pit crate of the launch had floated up as the craft filled with water. Dave waded to it, pulled it ashore, and rolled Schmitt-Schmitt across it.

He was now quite hidden from the view of those aboard of the gunboat, but he feared they might send a yawl on an investigating expedition.

Dave swam, pushing the crate before him. Often he glanced back. There was no pursuit. More hopefully and nearer and nearer he approached the Swallow. With a kind of a faint cheer Dave hailed her as he came within hearing distance.

"Ahoy, there!" rang back Captain Broadbeam's foghorn voice, as he gazed down at crate, burden, and swimmer.

"It's me-Dave Fearless," began the latter.

"Bet it is! Had to have a rumpus, eh? What was the shooting? Lower away there, men. Two of you, eh? What! that rascally pawnbroker, Gerstein!" fairly yelled the captain, as by stages Dave and his captive came nearer, were helped by the crew, and now gained the deck of the Swallow.

"Yes, Captain Broadbeam," nodded the nearly exhausted Dave. "The gunboat-after us-suggest you get away-at once-excuse-weak and dizzy-"

And just then Dave Fearless sank flat to the deck of the Swallow, overcome completely after the hardest work he had ever done in his life.

CHAPTER XII

OVERBOARD

"What does he say, Captain Broadbeam?" asked Dave Fearless.

"Mum as an oyster, lad."

"Won't talk, eh?" remarked Dave's father. "Nothing come of giving him free board, and after all the trouble you had, Dave, in getting him onto the Swallow."

"You forget, father," reminded Dave, "it is one enemy the less to worry about."

"The lad's right," declared Captain Broadbeam. "It means a good deal to clip the wings of the main mover in this scheme against us. If Gerstein, or Sehmitt-Schmitt as he calls himself, won't do us any good, at least he can do us no harm as long as we hold him a prisoner. I reckon those fellows back at Minotaur Island are a little dazed at the slick way we disappeared, – ship, their crony, and all."

Bob Vilett, seated in the cabin with the others, laughed heartily.

"It was a big move and a good one, that of yours in capturing this rascal," he declared to Dave. "Now we certainly have the field to ourselves. The governor and the pilot can't follow us, for they don't know where we have gone. No one is on this treasure search except ourselves. It's a clear field, as I say."

"Until we reach the Windjammers' Island," suggested Dave. "I wouldn't wonder if Gerstein had left Captain Nesik and the others there, probably guarding the treasure while awaiting his return."

The Swallow had got away from the vicinity of Minotaur Island two days previous. Just as soon as, after his exciting capture of Gerstein, Dave had sufficiently recovered to explain matters to Captain Broadbeam, the latter had ordered on full steam, leaving the ironclad stuck on the sandbar.

Gerstein raved like a madman when the drug Dave had given him began to lose its effect. He threatened all kinds of things-the law, for one, for kidnapping-but Captain Broadbeam only laughed at him.

"Just one word, my hearty," he observed spicily. "As long as you behave yourself, outside of every man aboard having his eye on you to look out for tricks, you'll have bed and food with the best of us. Try any didos, though, and I clap you into irons-understand?"

Gerstein became at once sullen and silent. When he came on deck after that he spoke to nobody. Most of the time he remained shut up by himself in the little cabin apportioned to him.

The second day out Captain Broadbeam sought an interview with him. It was after a talk with Amos Fearless.

He offered Gerstein a liberal share of the treasure if he would divulge its whereabouts and tell what had become of the Raven and her crew.

Gerstein declined to say a word. He simply regarded the captain in a mocking, insolent way. It was evident that the fellow appreciated the full value of his knowledge concerning the treasure.

"He's counting on getting away from us somehow, before the cruise is over," reported Captain Broadbeam to his friends, "or he is taking chances on our running into a nest of his friends when we reach the Windjammers' Island."

The Swallow had a delightful run to Mercury Island. Before they reached it Gerstein was placed in the hold, and there closely guarded by two mariners until they had provisioned up and were once more on their way.

Dave had little to do except to wait the end of their cruise, yet he put in some busy hours. For three days he kept Stoodles at his side at the table in the captain's cabin, questioning him on every detail about the lay and outlines of the island they were sailing to. Then he made a chart of the island, and as near as possible from memory marked in the other island where they had recovered possession of the Swallow after it had been stranded during a cyclone.

The weather changed suddenly a day or two out from Mercury Island. They rode into a fierce northeaster, and it rained nearly all the time, with leaden skies and a choppy sea.

Dave was a good deal below. One afternoon, returning from a brief visit to Bob Vilett, as he was making for the cabin passageway, a chink of light attracted his attention.

It emanated from a crack in the paneling of the cabin occupied by Gerstein. Dave drew nearer to the chink, and could look quite clearly into the compartment that housed the person in whom he was naturally very much interested at all times.

"H'm!" said Dave, with a bright flicker in his eye. "He's making a chart, too, is he?"

The daylight was so dim that Gerstein had a lighted candle on the table at which he sat. Spread out before him was a sheet of heavy manila paper. It bore black outlines as if an irregular body of land, and had crosses and dots all over it.

At this Gerstein was working, thoughtfully scanning it at times and then making additions to it. Dave believed that it had something to do with the treasure.

"Our treasure," he reflected, "and I'll play something else than the spy if I get a chance to look over that chart, whatever it is."

He watched the man's movements for over half an hour. Then Gerstein folded up the paper, placing it in a thin tin tobacco box. This he secured in a pocket in the blue shirt he wore, buttoning the pocket flap securely.

Dave got no further sight of the mysterious paper, if such it was, during the next week. He felt himself justified in trying to get a chance to secure the little tin box. Twice he visited Gerstein's cabin secretly, while its occupant was on deck. Gerstein, however, apparently carried the box with him wherever he went.

One night, when he slept, Dave crept into the cabin, the door of which for a wonder had been left unlocked. He ransacked Gerstein's clothing, but with no result.

"Got it somewhere in bed with him," thought Dave. "I don't dare to try and find it, though. I would surely wake him up. I believe I will tell Captain Broadbeam about the little tin box. If it in any way concerns this treasure, why haven't we the right to take it away from Gerstein, even by force?"

Before Dave had an opportunity to consult with Captain Broadbeam, however, something transpired that changed all his plans.

It was a dark and stormy night. The weather had been rough all day. Dave came on deck about eight o'clock to find the captain on duty. A few men were making things tidy about the stern deck.

The Swallow was plowing the water, slanted like a swordfish in action. Dave held to a handle at the side of the cabin, peering into the darkness that hung about them like a pall.

According to the calculations of the captain they were somewhere in the vicinity of the Windjammers' Island-probably within fifty miles of it, he had told Amos Fearless at sunset.

As Dave stood there, braced and exhilarated by the dash of wind and spray, he saw Gerstein suddenly rush up the cabin stairs.

"Hello, what's up with him, I wonder," thought Dave.

The remark was caused by a view of the face of the fellow as he passed a lantern set near the forecastle. Gerstein seemed frightfully agitated. Heedless of the slippery deck, he plunged along towards the stern. Once or twice a lurch threatened to bring him clear over the rail and into the sea.

Dave could not resist following him to learn the cause of his perturbation. A swing of the boat sent him clinging to the rail. Holding firmly, Dave, within twelve feet of the stern, saw Gerstein dash in among the men busy there and heard him shout out:

"Barlow-quick. Is he here?"

"Here I am," answered the owner of that name, looking around from his task of lashing down the cover of a water butt.

"My shirt-your shirt-the one you loaned me while I had mine washed," spoke Gerstein, in an anxious, gasping tone. "I gave it back to you this afternoon."

"Yes, you did," nodded Barlow.

"Where is it? Have you it on-say, quick!"

"Threw it under my bunk. In the forecastle. Bunk nearest the gangway. Hey, you've no sea legs, that's sure."

A lurch of the steamer had sent Gerstein off his footing. He went headlong. His head struck the side, and for a second he lay stunned.

Before he had fairly got to his feet, Dave Fearless had acted under the impulse of a very vivid suggestion.

From what he had seen and heard he felt certain that Gerstein wanted the shirt he had borrowed because he had left something in his pocket.

"That tin box, I'll bet-why not?" cried Dave, making a dash in the direction of the forecastle.

Dave was so full of his idea that he did not take the trouble to look back to see if Gerstein was coming, too. He got to the forecastle, was down the gangway fast as he could go, and a second later was groping under Barlow's bunk.

"Here it is," he said, pulling out the garment in question. "Something in the pocket, too, yes, it's the box-the little tin box, I can tell by the feeling. Good!"

Dave hurried back up the steps. He just cleared them as Gerstein plunged rather than ran towards them. A steady light shone here.

"Say," bolted out Gerstein, at once recognizing the garment in Dave's hand, "that's my shirt."

"No, it isn't," declared Dave, swinging back as Gerstein made a grab at the garment. "It belongs to Barlow."

"I have something in it."

"I know you have."

"Ha, you spy! Let go, let go."

The result of a general mixing up of Dave and Gerstein was that each now had hold of the coveted garment.

As Gerstein spoke last he sagged and swung Dave around to one side.

Dave held on tightly. Suddenly Gerstein made a feint. He slackened the tension by a bend forward, one hand swung out.

Dave received a heavy blow at the side of the head. It was totally unexpected, and he loosed his grip and went reeling backward.

At that moment a terrific wave swept over the deck. Dave was submerged and carried along.

He tried in vain to catch at something. The tilt of the steamer sent him shooting outward, and the next moment he plunged over the rail into the sea below.

CHAPTER XIII

ADRIFT ON THE PACIFIC

The sea had been the natural element of Dave Fearless since his earliest childhood. In the stress of his present predicament, however, he felt that he was in the most critical situation of his life.

A great wave received him as he went overboard. A second swept over it, ingulfing him for a full half-minute, and he was battling desperately with the vortex caused in part by the storm, in part by the swiftly-moving steamer.

As the youth emerged into less furious elements, his first thought was of the Swallow. He dashed the water from his eyes with one hand and strained his sight.

"It's no use," he spoke. "She'll be out of reach in two minutes."

Dave did not try to shout. It would have done him no good, he realized. As he was lifted up on the crest of wave after wave, the vague spark of light that designated the Swallow grew fainter and farther away. Finally it was shut out from view altogether.

The water was buoyant, and aided by his expertness as a swimmer Dave did not sink at all, and found little difficulty in keeping afloat. But how long could this state of things last? he asked himself.

There was not the least possible hope of any aid from the Swallow. He had gone overboard unseen by any person except Gerstein.

"He will tell no one," reflected Dave. "In the first place it would be dangerous for him to do so, for they would suspect treachery on his part. In the next place he is probably glad to get rid of me. Unless Bob or father look into my stateroom, I shall not be missed before morning. By that time-"

Dave halted all conjecture there. The present was too vital to waste in idle surmises. He planned to use all the skill and endurance he possessed to keep afloat. He might do this for some hours, he calculated, unless the waves grew much rougher.

"It's a hard-looking prospect," Dave told himself, as he began to feel severely the strain of his situation. "Adrift on the Pacific! How far from land? As I know, the Swallow's course was out of the regular ocean track. The chances of ever seeing father and the others again are very slim."

Something slightly grazed Dave's arm as he concluded this rather mournful soliloquy. He grabbed out at the touch of the foreign object, but missed it. Then a second like object floated against his chest. This the lad seized.

It proved to be a piece of wood, part of a dead tree, about three inches in diameter and two feet long. Dave retained the fragment, although scarcely with the idea of using it as a float.

To his surprise these fragments, some large, some small, continued to pass him. In fact, he seemed in a sort of wave-channel, which caught and confined them, forming a species of tidal trough.

One piece was of quite formidable size. Dave threw his arms over it with a good deal of satisfaction, for it sustained his weight perfectly.

"Queer how I happened right into their midst. Where do they come from, anyhow?" reflected Dave. "Is it a hopeful sign of land?"

There was a lull in the tempest finally, but the darkness still hung over all the sea like a pall. Dave longed for daybreak. The discovery of the driftwood had given him a good deal of courage and hope.

For over eight hours Dave rocked and drifted, at the mere caprice of the waves. Wearied, faint, and thirsty, he tried to cheer himself thinking of the possibility of land near at hand.

Daylight broke at last, but a dense haze like a fog hung over the waters for an hour before the sun cleared it away. Eagerly Dave scanned in turn each point of the compass. A great sigh of disappointment escaped his lips.

"No land in sight," he said; "just the blank, unbroken ocean."

His plight was a dispiriting one. Dave felt that unless succor came in some shape or other, and that, too, very soon, his chances of ever seeing home and friends again were indeed remote.

He noted the widespread mass of driftwood with friendly eyes, for it broke the monotony of the green expanse that tired the sight with its illimitable continuity.

"There's a pretty big piece of driftwood," Dave said, looking quite a distance towards a larger object than he had yet seen. It rose and fell with the swaying of the wave. "If I could find a few such pieces I might construct a raft."

Dave began to swim off in the direction of the object in the distance. A great cry of joy escaped his lips as he neared it.

"It is not a log," he shouted rapturously, "but a boat. A small yawl. Oh, dear, but I am thankful!"

In his urgency to reach the boat Dave let go of the piece of driftwood that had served him so well. His eyes grew bright and he forgot all his discomfort and suffering.