Bobby Blake on a Plantation: or, Lost in the Great Swamp

Following his remarks, he read the list of those who would be given the unexpected and yet most welcome vacation. The boys listened breathlessly, each one hoping that he might be among the favored ones, and when the reading finished there were many stifled sighs of disappointment on the part of the majority, while the eyes of the elect glowed with satisfaction. Bobby and Fred were on the list, as well as Mouser and Shiner and Lee, but none of their other close friends were included in the dozen or more to be excused.

The exodus was not to take place for a day or two, because time was required for packing and for proper notification of their parents. Telegrams were already coming in from the latter who had heard or read of the fire, and the teaching staff had plenty of work in sending reassuring messages in reply. How the fire had started was a mystery.

When finally the boys were dismissed, they gathered in groups, discussing eagerly the program that had been mapped out by the head of the school. Some were jubilant, others despondent.

“Scubbity-yow!” cried Fred, executing a jig. “Best news I’ve heard since Sitting Bull sat down.”

“I love my books, but, oh! you vacation,” chuckled Shiner.

“If you fellows fell in the water, you’d come up with a fish in your mouth,” remarked Billy enviously.

“Never mind, Billy,” comforted Fred. “You’ll have all the more time to think up some poor jokes to spring on us when we get back.”

“I don’t know any poor ones,” replied Billy. “All of mine are good, too good anyway for you boobs to guess, I notice. By the way,” he continued, brightening up visibly, “here’s one of the best I ever thought of. Why is – ”

“Officer, he’s crazy again,” groaned Fred.

“Choke him off, somebody,” urged Mouser.

“But listen,” pleaded Billy.

“Not on your life,” was Shiner’s heartless rejoinder. “Here’s where we get a chance, fellows, to make Billy stew in his own juice. It’ll break his heart to have a joke all ready to spring and nobody to listen to it.”

“But you fellows don’t know what you’re missing,” warned Billy. “Why ought a cook – ”

“We’ll admit she ought, right off the reel,” interrupted Skeets, “so suppose we let it go at that.”

But Billy was not to be shaken from his prey, and he held on like grim death.

“Why ought a cook to get good wages?” he demanded.

“Because she needs the dough,” replied Mouser promptly. The suddenness of the response nearly took Billy off his feet.

“You must have heard that somewhere,” he said in a crestfallen way.

“Noah sprang that on Mrs. Noah when they were in the Ark,” jibed Mouser.

“I knew you wouldn’t have guessed it of your own accord,” retorted Billy, getting at least that much satisfaction out of his discomfiture.

Shortly after dinner, Bobby and Fred went to call on Lee. They found him in much better condition than they had expected. They had feared that the excitement of his experience the night before might have given him a set-back, but on the contrary his eyes were bright, and there was more color in his face than had been there at any time since he had been taken ill.

He was fervent in his thanks to Bobby and Fred for having saved his life, but they waved these aside and made as light of their own part in the proceedings as possible.

“It would certainly have been all up with me if it hadn’t been for you fellows,” declared Lee. “I suppose the smoke must have stupefied me before you came, because I can just remember staggering about the room without even having sense enough to find the door. It was an awfully plucky thing for you boys to do, and I owe it to you that I’m not dead this minute.”

“You certainly look to be far enough from dead now,” laughed Bobby.

“Perhaps the shock and shaking up did me good instead of harm,” rejoined the boy from the South. “I certainly feel better than I did at this time yesterday.”

“All the same, I guess the doctor wouldn’t prescribe it,” said Fred with a grin.

“Probably not,” smiled Lee. “By the way I hear that you two fellows are going to have a vacation.”

“Right you are,” chuckled Fred. “And maybe we’re not tickled to death about it, eh, Bobby?”

“You bet!” returned Bobby happily. “But you’re on the list too, Lee, although for that matter you’ve been having about all the vacation you wanted for the last two weeks.”

“That was the wrong kind of vacation.”

“Of course you’ll have to spend it here,” conjectured Fred.

“I’m not so sure of that,” replied Lee. “I was speaking to the doctor this morning and he said he thought I’d be able to make the trip home in two or three days from now. He thinks the warm southern weather is just what I need to bring me around all right again. So I telegraphed to my mother this morning about it and asked her to answer right away.”

He had barely finished speaking when there was a knock at the door, and a messenger entered with a telegram.

“Here it is now!” exclaimed Lee, his face lighting up with expectancy. “If you fellows will excuse me I’ll see what she says.”

He ran his eyes eagerly over the telegram, which was an unusually long one, and before it was finished gave a whoop of delight.

“Sounds as though you had good news,” remarked Bobby, as he saw the flushed face and sparkling eyes of his friend.

“I should say so!” cried Lee, waving the yellow slip above his head. “Listen to this part of it, fellows: ‘I cannot tell you how grateful I am to the brave boys who saved your life, and I want you to be sure to bring them along with you for a visit, if they would care to come.’ How about it fellows? Will you come along with me?”

“If we would care to come!” repeated Bobby. “You bet we’ll come!”

“Will a duck swim?” asked Fred, wild with delight at the vista opened up by the invitation. “That is,” he added a little more soberly, “if the folks at home will let us go.”

“Of course,” agreed Bobby. “But I haven’t much doubt about that. They let us go West on a ranch, and I don’t see why they shouldn’t be just as willing to have us go down South on a plantation. Come along, Fred, and we’ll write to them now, so that the letters will get to them to-morrow.”

“Why not telegraph?” asked Fred, who was bubbling over with excitement and impatience.

“It would cost too much,” replied practical Bobby. “We’ll have to write good long letters to explain everything and get them to let us go.”

“Put it strong,” counseled Lee. “I’ll be terribly disappointed if you can’t go with me. And I know that my mother will, too. I want to show you what life is on a real old-fashioned Southern plantation.”

“Don’t you worry,” replied Bobby. “If we can’t go, you can be sure that it won’t be any fault of ours.”

They put all their powers of persuasion into the letters they wrote, and were especially urgent that the answers should be sent at once. Then they waited with feverish impatience for the replies.

These were not long in coming, for the second day after they wrote they received the answers. They tore the letters open with quaking hearts, for fear that they might prove unfavorable. And their delight was beyond bounds when they found that they might go. There were long letters of advice and injunctions to take the best care of themselves. And there was also in each letter a substantial check to cover all expenses of the trip. It was made plain to both that the ready agreement to let them go was largely due to their behavior at the time of the fire, and was in the nature of a reward.

To save a great deal of unnecessary traveling, it was arranged that the boys should go directly from Rockledge School to New York. It was thought best that they should go South by boat, instead of rail, and a separate letter to Dr. Raymond requested that he should telegraph for passage and stateroom in advance, and make what other arrangements might be necessary for the trip.

As may be imagined, the next two days were busy ones for the three boys. But at last all was ready, and with a big send-off from their chums, they took the train for New York. The journey was a pleasant though uneventful one, and they reached the city too late to do anything but go directly to their stateroom on the boat.

The next morning, after a hearty breakfast, they took up their position on the rail and watched the scene of busy life on the pier. There was great noise and animation as the last freight was put into the hold and belated passengers hurried down to the vessel. But at last order was brought out of confusion and the bell rang the signal for “All Ashore.”

CHAPTER IX

OFF FOR THE SOUTH

Amid the jangling of engine room bells, the hiss of escaping steam, and the hoarse cries of the deck hands, the boat moved majestically out into the broad river, two small but very efficient tugboats pushed and hauled at the heavy steamer, butting their stubby noses desperately against her towering sides to counteract the effects of the strong tide. Long strings of heavily loaded barges, towed by other snorting tugs, passed up and down stream, while numerous ferryboats added their bit to the heavy river traffic.

Leaning over the rail, the three friends were absorbed in watching this busy scene. To them it seemed impossible that their own boat could get safely started without colliding with any of the swarming smaller craft. But after much maneuvering and tooting of whistles the big steamer finally got her nose pointing downstream and headed slowly for the lower bay.

“Gee!” exclaimed Bobby, drawing a deep breath, “I don’t understand yet how we got out here without bumping something. I always thought it was kind of hard to dodge eleven men on a football field without coming to grief, but this makes it look easy.”

“Well, it always did seem to be easy enough for you, as far as that goes,” remarked Fred. “But don’t forget we’ve got lots of chances yet to hit something before we get to New Orleans. The man that steers this overgrown canoe may go to sleep and land us on some nice hard rocks, or we may hit a floating wreck, or – ”

“Don’t stop,” urged Lee, as Fred hesitated a moment in search of some other ghastly possibility, “you’ll have us really enjoying this trip pretty soon. Somebody please tie a life preserver on me.”

“Well, perhaps you’ve never been on anything bigger than Monatook Lake, and it’s only right that we experienced sailors should prepare you for the worst. Of course, we may be lucky enough to get there all right, but whatever happens, you can’t say we didn’t warn you.”

“This is a nice time to warn a fellow, isn’t it?” said Lee, with a grin, “but I’m not going to ask the captain to stop the boat now and let me walk ashore, so you may as well save all those cheerful predictions for some other time.”

“He won’t scare worth two cents, will he?” laughed Bobby. “But maybe when he gets his first dose of seasickness he won’t feel so cheerful.”

While the boys were talking, the ship had made steady progress, and now, passing the Statue of Liberty, was well into the lower bay. Here the tugs left it, and the great steamer vibrated from stem to stern as its powerful engines took up the task appointed them. In quick succession they passed the Ambrose and Sandy Hook lights, and began to feel the roll and heave of the great blue ocean.

“Isn’t this great?” exclaimed Bobby. “Just fill your lungs with that air, fellows.”

“The air is fine, all right,” said Fred. “But a little something to fill my stomach wouldn’t be so awful bad, either.”

“That sounds like Pee Wee,” laughed Bobby. “But since you mention it, I begin to feel hungry too. How about you, Lee?”

“You bet,” exclaimed the boy from the South, but his voice lacked the tone of sincerity. Fred looked at him and grinned.

“What’s the matter, Lee?” he inquired. “You don’t mean to tell me you’re feeling seasick, do you?”

“Of course I’m not seasick.”

“No, of course he isn’t seasick,” said Bobby, with a wink at Fred. “He just doesn’t feel well, that’s all. People are often that way on salt water. It must be something about the air, I guess.”

“Yes, that’s probably it,” agreed Fred, in a tone of deep sympathy. “What you need, Lee, is a good bang up supper to set you up. How would a nice pork chop or two hit you?”

“I don’t know how they’d hit me, but I do know that something is going to hit you pretty quick, if you don’t stop talking about eats,” retorted Lee. “You two go on down and eat your heads off. I’m going to stay up here a while. I had a big lunch, anyway.”

“Well, you probably won’t have it much longer,” was Fred’s parting shot, as he and Bobby started on a run for the dining room.

There were a number of empty places around the tables, but Bobby and Fred enjoyed the meal hugely, with appetites no whit affected by the uneasy motion of the ship. When they had finished, they went on deck again, and found Lee coiled up in a steamer chair, and looking far from happy.

“Guess I’ll have to admit that I’m seasick,” he said, with a somewhat feeble grin, “but I’ve got lots of company, anyway. Most everybody I’ve seen so far seems to be as bad or worse than I am.”

“Oh, well, it probably won’t last long,” said Bobby. “If you can get a decent rest to-night, you’ll be all right in the morning.”

“I wouldn’t mind so much now if we did hit some of those rocks Fred was talking about,” went on the boy from the South. “If I could get onto a nice solid rock right now, I know I’d feel a whole lot better.”

But when the next morning came, the ocean was very calm, and Lee felt almost himself again, so that he could aid his two friends in their attacks on the excellent meals that were provided for them. They read, played deck games, and altogether enjoyed themselves immensely. On the second day of the trip, they noticed that the air was becoming perceptibly warmer, and knew that they were getting into southern waters. Schools of porpoises raced with the ship, and the boys never tired watching them shooting through the water just under the ship’s bows, and keeping up their speed without any apparent effort. Several times they saw little flying fish, and once Fred was sure that he saw a shark, but when the ship came up with the object that he had seen, it proved to be nothing more ferocious than a half submerged log.

“Some sailor, you are,” said Lee, anxious to get even with Fred for some of the remarks passed on his own seamanship. “I may not be as salty as some people think they are, but still I can tell fishes from trees.”

“Well, I’m glad you know that much, anyway,” said Fred. “You certainly are coming along fast. Some day, when you get over calling portholes windows, you’ll be a real sailor.”

“I don’t think I ever want to be a sailor,” retorted Lee. “Good old solid ground is good enough for me. Seems to me this old tub is jumping around worse all the time.”

“It would be strange if it didn’t,” said Bobby. “The wind is getting stronger every minute, and it’s working up some pretty big seas.”

Almost as he finished speaking a big wave dashed against the bow, and showered them with spray.

“I’m going some place where it’s dry!” gasped the boy from the South, and dashed for the companionway. Bobby and Fred lingered a while, but were soon, forced to seek shelter in the lee of a deckhouse. They could see members of the crew going about making every movable object fast, and they guessed that they were in for a storm.

CHAPTER X

HALF A GALE

In an incredibly short space of time a heavy sea was running, and the big ship, which at its dock had seemed so solid and immovable, was tossed about almost wholly at the will of the angry waves. The bow would rise up and up as it met a rushing hill of frothing green water, then, as the giant wave rushed astern, the bow would dip, and the whole vessel would seem to be coasting down into a frothing valley. Crests of the big rollers, picked up and flung aboard by the howling wind, drenched any hardy soul who ventured on deck. Sometimes the bow would not lift quickly enough to an onrushing wave, and the water would crash down on the forecastle with a tremendous impact and rush aft, sweeping any movable object along with it.

The engines were throttled down to “half speed ahead,” which eased the laboring of the vessel somewhat. Night fell early over a wild and desolate waste of tossing waters, and even the three carefree boys were sobered somewhat as they gazed through tightly bolted portholes at the scene without. Lee was frankly seasick again, and even Bobby and Fred had to admit that they “felt a little off.”

“But anyway, a storm like this isn’t likely to last long,” remarked Bobby. “It came up in a hurry, and likely will go down just as fast.”

“It can’t go too fast to suit me,” groaned Lee, “‘A life on the rolling deep’ may be all right for some people, but it rolls entirely too much to be popular with me.”

“Not to mention how deep it is when the ship happens to sink,” said Fred. “Whether we like it or not, we’ve got to admit that the man who wrote that poetry knew what he was talking about.”

“Well, it’s time for supper, and I’m going to have some,” said Bobby. “What do you say, fellows? Are you with me?”

“Guess you’ll have to count me out,” replied the boy from the South. “I don’t think food and I will ever be friends again.”

Bobby and Fred managed to satisfy their appetites, although the dishes persisted in dodging here and there in a most disconcerting manner, and never seemed to be satisfied until they had settled themselves comfortably in some one’s lap. Most of the passengers were keeping to their staterooms, and taken altogether, the meal was not exactly a cheerful affair. All three of the boys turned into their berths soon afterward, and by dint of wedging themselves in with pillows and rolled up articles of clothing, managed to get a fairly good night’s rest.

In the morning the wind appeared to have blown itself out, and as the boys were dressing a weak and watery shaft of sunlight came streaming through the porthole.

“That certainly looks good to me,” said Lee, who still looked rather pale and unhappy. “If ever I get back on dry land, I’m going to stay there a while.”

“It won’t feel bad for a change,” admitted Fred, “and with a little luck we ought to make it in another day or two. We’d have gotten in without this delay if it hadn’t been for the storm.”

After breakfast the boys went on deck, and found the ocean much moderated, although still far from calm. After a little, they found themselves near the door of the wireless room, and were soon chatting with the operator on duty, who seemed to be a genial sort of fellow. He and the boys were soon on the best of terms, and he explained the workings of some of the simpler parts of the apparatus.

“I suppose a night like last night keeps you fellows pretty busy, doesn’t it?” inquired Bobby.

“Yes, we have to be right on the job,” answered Quinn, the wireless operator, “although last night wasn’t as bad as many I’ve been through. We didn’t get an S. 0. S. call once.”

“From the way this ship was acting,” said Lee, ruefully, “I should think it would be more likely that we would be sending a call for help instead of receiving it.”

“Why, that wasn’t any more than a brisk breeze compared to some of the blows I’ve been through,” said Quinn. “I remember one night on the North Sea when it really did blow some. And as far as that goes, I’m willing to bet that everybody else on that ship remembers it, too.”

“Was it so very bad, then?” inquired Bobby.

“Well, at that time I was doing duty on a converted yacht. We were guarding a convoy, and one by one the other patrol boats made for port, being unable to stay out any longer. But our captain refused to give up, and finally we were the only boat left. Well, the wind kept blowing harder and the seas rising, until the only wonder is that we weren’t swamped altogether. Tremendous seas were following us, and at last one monster came right aboard over the after rail. It slammed up against the wireless shack, and before we knew what had happened, we and the shack were carried bodily forward. We thought that our last minute had come, but, luckily for us, the wireless house was slammed up against the forward deck house. Then it went to pieces entirely. I made a grab for the first thing my hand met, which happened to be a mast stay, and hung on for all I knew how. It seemed to me that I was under water for an age, but the big wave finally passed, and I crawled back to the deck more dead than alive. Yes, that was a real rough night at sea, I’ll admit.”

“How about the other wireless men?” queried Fred. “Did they come through all right?”

“Well, by a miracle neither was swept overboard, but Pearsall, who had just joined the ship a week or two before, broke his right arm. But he considered himself lucky to be alive at all. We all did, for that matter.”

“I should think you would be,” said Bobby, “and I suppose you had plenty of other narrow escapes besides that one.”

“Plenty is right,” assented Quinn, “Why, I remember one winter afternoon we got an S.O.S. from a munition ship that had caught fire. It was some eighty miles to the west of us, and by the time we reached it, it was right on the edge of dark. When we got there, the fire was at its height. Most of their boats had been wrecked by the explosions of ammunition as the fire reached it, and most of the crew were in the water, some with life preservers, and others clinging to bits of floating wreckage. It was like going through a barrage to get near them. But we lowered our boats and finally got the last man safely aboard. Then we steamed away at a rate the old hooker had never hit up before, because we knew that when the fire reached the main hold there would be a blowup that would pretty well clean everything that happened to be around right off the water. And we weren’t a bit too soon either, because we hadn’t covered more than half a mile when the blazing wreck exploded with a slam that you could hear for fifty miles. As it was, we were pretty well shaken up, but got off without any serious damage. But it was pretty ticklish business while we were cruising round a cable’s length away, picking the crew out of the water.”

CHAPTER XI

QUICK THINKING

“It must have taken some nerve to do it at all,” declared Lee admiringly.

“Well, we knew they’d have done the same thing for us, if conditions had been the other way round,” said Quinn. “If seamen didn’t help each other out that way, the life would be even harder than it is.”

The boys were eager to hear more of the wireless man’s adventures, and he, nothing loth, spun them more than one yarn of exciting episodes in far corners of the earth, for he had been almost everywhere that ships go. He was often interrupted by messages coming or going, but the boys were fascinated by his stories, and could hardly tear themselves away when dinner time came.

“That man has surely seen a lot,” remarked Bobby, while they were eating an excellent meal, “and he knows how to tell about what he has seen, too. I’m sorry we didn’t get acquainted with him earlier on the trip.”

“So am I,” agreed Lee, “but he’ll be on duty again this evening, and if we get a chance we can look him up then.”

After lunch the three friends went on deck again. The sea by this time was quite calm, and the boys strolled over to the port side and, leaning on the rail, gazed idly out over the broad expanse of waters.

Suddenly the lads heard a shrill yell and a heavy splash alongside the ship. One of the mess boys, a young negro, had been sitting carelessly on the rail not far from where the boys were standing, when a sudden lurch of the vessel had thrown him off his balance and he had made a clean dive overboard.

For a second the boys were stunned by the unexpectedness of the accident. Then Bobby whipped out his jacknife, cut loose a life preserver that Fred was trying to loosen, and tossed it to the struggling negro in the water. He judged his distance so accurately that the buoy landed within a foot or two of the unfortunate darkey, who with a desperate struggle caught hold of it.

Meanwhile, Fred and Lee were shouting “man overboard,” and the cry, passed from mouth to mouth, reached the bridge. The engine room telegraph rang “stop” and then “full speed astern.” Almost before the big ship had come to a shuddering standstill, a boat had been lowered, and in short time they had the gasping darkey boy aboard.