Motor Boat Boys' River Chase; or, Six Chums Afloat and Ashore

Jack was himself on the logs by this time, and Jenks followed him. He hoped the men at bay would not start shooting toward them, for they were more or less exposed to any fire unless they managed to drop down behind a stray log that had at some time gotten loose, and was hauled on top of the raft by the men in charge, rather than have it lost.

“Keep by your boat, George!” was the first thing Jack called out, “or better still, if you can work it around to where the Tramp lies. Perhaps we’d be wise to keep in a bunch, you know.”

“A good idea, Jack,” came the reply. “Andy, do you dare walk across, while I get a move on, and swim around?”

“Me, is it ye arre afther askin’ that? Well, till me what’s to hinder me from doin’ the same?” and with the words the dripping Andy started to clamber along the slippery logs with utter abandon; he had been in the river once, and was just as wet as he could be, so why should he care if he went overboard again?

George started up and was seen to leave the float.

“Good-bye, and good riddance to you!” the big man shouted, as he thrust his head out of the opening in front of the cabin on the raft; from which remark it might be set down that he had not heard what Jack said, and really believed the motor boat was about to pull out for good.

“All right,” replied the other, for it was not difficult to please Josh under most circumstances.

George had gone around the raft, passing below, so that he was now coming up the river, and it was easy for him to bring his boat alongside the raft without any bumping worth mentioning.

He quickly leaped on to the logs, rope in hand, and found a place to fasten his hawser without much trouble.

“Where are they, fellows?” he asked, breathlessly, as he joined the group.

“Still in the shack, but we’re going to try and get them out,” Jack answered.

“That’s right,” Josh broke in just then; “you see, Jack’s going to try a scheme of mine, and offer the men a chance to get off, on condition that they hand over that bag they got. We don’t want to bother with persons, if only we c’n trap that little bag, and take it back with us.”

“Rats!” said George, immediately, for he never had the least bit of faith in any idea which Josh might originate; it would have put a different face on it if Jack had advanced the scheme; but with the other as its sponsor, the thing was impossible in the start and condemned before he heard the particulars.

“Well, you never know,” Josh went on to say, as if he felt hurt at George being so positive before the proposition had even been tried, “they might be that bad scared they’d agree to anything that left ’em their liberty. Anyhow, guess there ain’t any harm in doin’ it, is there?”

“Wait and see!”

And with that Jack turned toward the center of the raft, where the little refuge lay, which the two loggers made use of as sleeping quarters, and to keep themselves dry during a downpour of rain.

“Hello! you in the cabin?” he called out.

“Well, what d’ye want?” came the answer, and as before, it was evidently the big man who did all the talking, for as yet they had not once heard the voice of Slim Jim raised above a low murmur, when he was arguing with his companion.

“We’ve got an offer to make you,” continued Jack.

“Oh! have yuh? Then spit her out, and be quick about it,” came from inside.

“We’ll agree to let you both go, if you hand over that bag, and all that’s in it,” Jack continued. “We’ve got you caged, anyway, and it’s only a question of going for the officers in one of our boats, when we come to a large town; and you’ll be taken, bag and all. Better think it over. And we don’t mean to let you work the sweep of this raft, so you can’t ferry it to the shore. What do you say?”

He was answered with a mocking laugh, and some hard words.

“What d’ye take us for, younker, a pair of fools? Think we went to all that trouble and risk to turn the proceeds over to a passel o’ kids so easy? Don’t you worry ’bout us, now. We got the guns to hold the fort; and when we get good and ready p’raps we’ll skip out. There’s more ways to skin a cat than one. Get that, now?”

“I thought so,” said George, with one of his irritating little laughs. “Now just get busy, Josh, and think up some more fool plays, won’t you? Or else leave the job to your betters, Jack’n me, we’ll play the game for keeps, eh, Jack?”

CHAPTER XXI

MAKING THINGS WARM

“Well, what are we going to do next, Jack?” asked Josh, pretending not to hear those irritating words spoken by George; and evidently determined to keep himself “in the swim” if anything was going on.

“The question is whether we’d better try to force their hand now, or wait a while,” the one spoken to remarked.

“Why should we wait?” queried George, impatiently.

“First of all, there’s some sort of chance that Herb may be along pretty soon, with his Comfort, and that would give us three more fellows,” Jack observed.

“Huh! such as they are, yes,” the skipper of the speed-boat admitted.

“Three would make good showing, anyhow,” Josh broke in to say, seeing his opportunity to agree with Jack, and in this way put George on the other side. “And how’d they know, tell me, that Buster, Herb and our new friend, Algernon, ain’t much on the scrap? Numbers look big, sometimes.”

“Then again,” Jack continued, “as we float down the river we’re apt to sight the lights of some town or city. And then George could go ashore to tell the police what a great chance was passing their doors. I’m not greedy about it, and willing enough to let the proper authorities do the fighting, and get what there is in the game. And yet, it kind of goes against my grain to just lie around here, doing nothing all the time.”

“Yes,” said George, eagerly, “and just think if we happen to drift anywhere near the bank these fellows are apt to give us the laugh and jump overboard, to swim ashore. Before we could get a boat started to chase after ’em they’d land, and snap their fingers at the lot. I say get a move on, and find some way to make ’em surrender. Let’s scare the pair half to death. We c’n do it by setting the cabin on fire, and paying for the damage done!”

“Whew! that’s just like George!” Josh was heard to say, breathlessly.

Jack glanced toward the two loggers.

“Is that sort of a thing possible; could the shanty be burned if we tried?” he asked them.

“Don’t think it kin, son,” came the reply. “Course we never seen it tried; but them logs are kinder green yet, and the spray’s jumped up over the cabin sometimes when we had a headwind. They ain’t no winder in the shack, jest a openin’ like round on the back. I cud crawl up and try the fire game, if so yuh stand ready tuh pony up fur any damage tuh the logs.”

Jack was thinking again.

“Well, it might pay us to make the try,” he said, presently.

“No harm done,” said George, giving Josh a triumphant look, as though he would have him take notice that when really smart fellows started to do things, they meant business every time.

Josh shrugged his shoulders, as much as to say that he was ready to be convinced. Meanwhile Jack was talking with the two loggers, trying to find out what their ideas might be with regard to getting a supply of kindling ready. One of them strode off, and presently returned with an ax. The other had picked up several strips of wood that seemed to be fairly dry; and as soon as the sharp-edged tool came he started to cut this into long splinters.

“By the way,” said George, “I’ve got some cotton waste aboard my boat that’s just soaked with oil, and would burn like fun. I’ll get it.”

“And if you go aboard my boat, too, you’ll find a lot more close by the engine, that I was going to throw overboard, because it was getting so sticky,” Jack went on to tell the other, as he was hurrying off.

It really began to look like business, at any rate. Josh found himself interested in spite of himself. No matter whose plan it might be, if it won out he must show a spirit of fairness, and render all the aid he could. Josh was not a small minded fellow, though he did love to tease poor Buster on occasion; and often went out of his way to get a sly dig at the good-natured fat boy.

The strips of wood having been reduced to kindling, and George coming back with the cotton waste, saturated with oil that would burn, even if it was not explosive, it began to look as though the thing was now up to the logger who had offered to make the attempt.

“Here’s a little bottle, and it’s full of gasoline too,” remarked George, as he handed the article over. “When you’re ready to set fire to the pile, just scatter that stuff over it, and take care of your eyebrows, for she goes off with a whoop.”

“Say, they’re on to us,” announced Josh just then.

Looking toward the cabin, Jack could detect a head thrust around the corner; and from this he knew that one of the men had issued forth, wishing to learn what the forces arrayed against himself and his partner might be doing all this while.

So Jack made suggestive motions with his gun, as though tempted to shoot; and the head was withdrawn immediately.

“Is there any opening on the back of the shack?” he asked the men.

“Nope, not that yuh cud notice, son,” came the reply.

“Course, they might dodge out and run around to blaze away at our fire kindler, and then get back under cover again,” suggested George.

“I was thinking if I could work it so as to keep them quiet,” said Jack. “Let’s all move around so as to cover the side where the open door is. Then they’ll be liable to think we’re all there in a bunch. And if we see either man trying to sneak out, I’ll give him a scare, all right.”

To do this they had to go some little distance from the three tied-up motor boats; but Jack knew they could reach them long before the fugitives might, should they conceive the wild idea of making a dash that way. Besides, as a last resort, did he not have his gun, and were there not two trusty shells in its barrels?

Having taken up their position they gave the man who had remained behind the signal that he should get busy. And he started to advance toward the rear of the cabin on the raft.

When he had gone perhaps half way, a figure was seen to push out of the opening. Jack immediately called out:

“Get back there, or I’ll fill you full of shot!” at the same time brandishing his gun in a very threatening manner; which warning appeared to have an influence upon the fellow, since he slipped back again.

But no doubt he had discovered the logger who was advancing toward the rear of the shack, his arms filled with fuel; and it would have to be a very dull person who could not guess what his object must be.

Then there sounded a sudden report. One of the men in the shack had found some small chink between the logs, through which he was firing his revolver. Perhaps he had shot at the logger; and then again it might have been done just to alarm him, and thus cause the scheme for firing the cabin to be given up.

When the man seemed to drop, Jack’s heart was in his throat, for he thought he was looking on a tragedy; but the other logger chuckled, as he remarked:

“Don’t be skeered ’bout Fritz; he ain’t teched a whiff; but jest drapped so’s to crawl out’n range. See him gittin’ over ground right smart now, and notice thet he ain’t let go any o’ the stuff, be he?”

“You’re right, Hanky,” said Josh, promptly enough.

“Bully for Fritz!” burst out the gratified George, whose heart had no doubt taken just as quick a jump as had Jack’s, when that report sounded in a half muffled way, from being inside the cabin.

Another shot followed. But the marksman was evidently shooting at random, and without having a target. At any rate, the logger kept right on creeping toward the shack, and it began to look as though he were bound to get there, too.

But would he be successful in getting the logs to burn?

Jack was rather inclined to doubt it, though of course much depended on whether they were fairly dry, or wet with the spray that may have dashed up over the raft when the wind, being up-river, had made a choppy sea.

“What if the whole blooming raft goes up in smoke?” was the awful suggestion which Josh put forward.

George laughed out loud, it seemed to strike him as so absurd.

“Yes, and worse still, Josh, whatever will we do if we set the river on fire? They’ll certainly have it in for us, believe me. But one thing sure, no danger of you ever setting the river afire with any scheme you think up.”

“Shucks! I don’t believe it’ll work a cent,” remarked Josh. “’Cording to my calculations it’d take more’n that kindlin’ to set logs a-goin’.”

“Don’t forget the oiled rags, Josh,” said George, tauntingly; “yes, and the little bottle of gasolene I let our friend have. Seems to me all that’s going to build up some fire. And as for the rest we’ll have to trust to luck. Perhaps it’ll catch fire, and again she may kick and balk.”

“Like some engines we know about, f’r instance,” Josh wound up with.

“You never saw a motor do better than mine did coming down river, and you know it. I have had a lot of trouble with the thing in the past; but that’s all over now; and I’m on Easy Street with my dandy Wireless. Oh! you can laugh all you want to, Josh, but wait and see.”

“Proof of the puddin’ lies in the eatin’ of the same, George,” said Josh, “and I know you too well to believe you’ll ever be satisfied to run along like Jack and Herb do. But see there, our fire kindler’s got up to the shack, all serene. And now he’s bending down to fix his kindlin’ right. We’ll soon know, George, and if she goes, since it’s your scheme, I’m willing to say you done it with your little hatch-it.”

Just as Josh said, the logger had managed to gain the shelter of the back wall of the shack. Now, in order to keep out the rain without bothering with a door, the cabin had been made with its only opening on the side up-river; so that what the boys had been calling its back was really the front side.

And with the movement of the raft always down-stream; and the night air being from the south just then, if the fire were ever properly started, it would be fanned constantly, and helped along by this process.

Jack kept watch on the dark opening that stood for the entrance, and means of exit. He meant to shoot, if any figure was seen to appear outside this; not with the idea of doing bodily injury, but in the expectation of frightening the man back, before he could make use of his weapon upon the fire-kindler.

So the seconds crept along, until several minutes had passed.

“Gee! why don’t he get a move on?” remarked George, to whom the time hung as if it were weighed down with lead.

“Let him be,” said the other logger, named Hanky. “Fritz is sum slow, but then he gits there in the end. Watch his smoke, son, an’ see!”

CHAPTER XXII

“DROP THAT BAG”

They kept waiting, but George was very nervous because nothing seemed to happen. He growled to himself more than a few times; but none of the other boys paid any attention to that; because they knew George pretty well, and had run up against his little failings many a time.

George had no use for “slow-pokes.” He expected to see Rome built in a day, and strange to say, while he met with lots of trouble on account of this very desire for haste, it did not seem to effect any permanent cure in his disposition; for as soon as the unpleasant result had worn off, he was the same old George again, – Hurricane George, they used to call him at home.

“There, looks like he’s about got it fixed now,” announced Josh, presently.

“Oh! thank goodness!” said the skipper of the Wireless with a sigh of gratification that welled up from his very heart. “Now perhaps there’ll be something doing.”

“He’s getting out a match,” Josh went on.

“You mean he’s hunting all through his pockets for one,” corrected Jack.

That gave George another spell of the blues.

“Chances are he won’t have a blessed match about him,” he observed, despairingly. “And I’ve got half a notion right now to crawl out there, and do the business for Fritz.”

“No need,” remarked Josh, “he’s found one!”

Then they watched again, while the logger went through with a lot of what seemed to George utterly useless actions, fixing the kindling up a little better. And finally he started to strike the match.

The boys held their breath as they saw it flame up.

“Now, look out, Fritz, or you’ll lose your eyebrows!” George was heard to mutter; as the logger leaned over to apply the little flame, which he had been shielding with both hands, after the manner of an old smoker.

“Wow!”

Josh did not mean to call out, but the cry was almost forced from his lips as he saw a vivid flash of fire, that seemed to jump as high as the roof of the little log shack.

“That was the gasolene!” remarked George, coolly.

“Fritz got stung, I guess, because he tumbled over backwards,” Josh ventured, as his opinion; but although Jack had imagined that something along those lines might have happened, he did not see the man show any signs of suffering, as he started to crawl away from the spot, glancing over his shoulder now and then, as if to reassure himself that everything was going well.

“Naw, he’s all right; Fritz kin be quick when he wants to get out o’ the way o’ things that hurts,” the fellow logger advanced.

“Wonder if she’s going to take hold?” Josh ventured, as he watched the fire eat into the kindling merrily.

“Wouldn’t be s’prised if she did, now?” Hank remarked, as though he had experienced a change of heart since the match had been applied. “Looky thar at the way it’s eatin’ up the logs. Gosh! that makes a hot fire, boys, with them oil rags to keep her a-goin’. And sure as yuh live I c’n see it getting a grip o’ the logs right now. Guess we won’t hev airy shanty, come morning. But who keers. A little saw-buck o’ a ten dollar bill wud make that squar.”

Jack looked around.

If the cabin really caught fire, and began to burn furiously, it would not be long before those within would have to vacate. He wanted to get a good idea as to what their next move would be; and for that reason he took this observation, so as to be posted.

And the first thing he saw was that the current of the river had swung the log raft in to the western shore during the last ten minutes or so. Why, it was not more than a hundred yards away; and as the moon hung in the east, the whole shore line was brightly illuminated.

Would not that prove an irresistible attraction to the pair of hunted thieves, provided they could swim? As a last resort might they not think to make a run for the edge of the raft, and spring overboard?

That was all right, provided they left the little bag behind. If on the other hand they tried to carry it off, Jack must know what to do about it. He feared that sooner than give up their plunder the scoundrels would deliberately throw it into the river, and thus defraud the depositors and stockholders of the Lawrence bank out of their valuable property, as well as sink the evidence that might be used to incriminate them as the looters of the institution.

How to prevent this was the question that was bothering Jack.

Would he be justified in trying to cripple one of the robbers in case they attempted to carry out such a bold scheme?

He decided this quickly, when he remembered what misery would likely follow the loss of the bag, with its contents. Yes, what was one wretch’s suffering when compared with that which would follow the closing of the bank’s doors, and a sign on the outside telling that it would never be able to open again, because of the loss of the entire funds, and negotiable papers, as the paper had said.

Well, there did not seem to be any more doubt about the success of the fire, at any rate; for already were the flames beginning to creep up the wall of the cabin, licking greedily at the wood. They had gained such a good start that unless some fire-fighter got busy in a hurry, that shack was doomed, for the breeze fanned the flames wonderfully.

“They’re coming out!” snapped George.

“Get ready, Jack, to drop ’em!” shouted Josh.

“There’s the old Comfort drawing alongside the raft by our boats!” Jack sent back at them just then.

Perhaps those in the cabin had already discovered the other boat coming down with the current, for the opening was toward the up-river end of the float, it may be remembered.

If so, it must have surely added to their uneasiness. They could see a number of persons aboard, and in the deceptive moonlight how were they to know that these passengers on the big launch were hardly to be classed with fighters, at least not very ferocious ones?

Imagine the astonishment of Herb and Buster, not to speak of Algernon, when, on nearing the dark object they had discovered ahead, it was to suddenly discover a blaze shooting up; and then on looking further to see Jack, George, Josh, Andy and the man Jenks, as well as two strange raftsmen ranged, about on a raft of logs, watching the burning cabin, as though it contained something they were greatly interested in.

And then to find the stolen white launch tied up to the raft – that must have given them a clue so they could figure things out fairly well.

The men had thrust their heads out at the time George and Josh seemed so positive they were coming. They could not have fancied the situation much; but then the sight of land so near by may have put some heart into them.

As the fire got hotter their condition must be growing more and more unpleasant. Jack knew that it was only a question of minutes, or more properly, seconds, before they would be forced to expose themselves, and he was nerving himself for that crisis.

He saw Jenks and one of the loggers start to move to the other side of the raft, as though they would anticipate the possible coming of the men in that direction and be on hand to meet them.

“Keep clear, so that I can fire!” he called to them, making his voice as vociferous as possible, in order that the hiding men might catch every word, and be more or less affected by the startling intelligence.

“Oh! why didn’t I bring my gun along?” groaned George, who was suffering agonies because he just had to stand there, and watch some one else run things; whereas, did he happen to have a weapon in his hands, he might have taken a much more prominent part in the proceedings.

One good thing about George was that he always wanted to be on the firing line; for he did not have a drop of craven blood in his veins. In baseball, football, hockey, it was all the same; George could be found wherever the play was fiercest, taking and giving knocks without a murmur, if only there was action, action, and then more action.

Jack heard his lament, and was secretly just as well satisfied to have things as they were. George was so impulsive that he might do things to be regretted in calmer moments. Such a hot-headed fellow was dangerous with firearms, especially when there seemed some little excuse for making a use of the same against a law-breaking pair like the bank robbers.

For a couple of minutes nothing happened; but the fire was burning fiercely and crackling at a great rate. Josh looked rather serious as he contemplated the conflagration; perhaps he was remembering George’s absurd threat with regard to setting the river on fire; and thinking that they would surely have to get away before such a catastrophe came to pass.

Then, just what Jack had been expecting came about.

“There! there! Jack, look! knock ’em over!” shrieked George, as two figures started out of the burning shack on the raft, and began to hasten across the slippery logs as fast as they could go.

One of them, the larger, carried the hand bag; and from his determined manner it looked as though he meant to cling to that through thick and thin. Jenks and the two loggers were already trying to cut the fugitives off, and as though they began to fear lest that should really happen the robbers changed their course a little, though still heading for the side of the raft that lay nearest the western bank of the river, so close at hand.

Jack fired one barrel of his gun, but he did not try to hit the fleeing men. It was just intended to let them know he had their range, for chips and water flew close beside the one who carried the bag.

“Drop that bag, or the next shot will lame you for life, do you hear?” shouted the boy, now fully resolved that he would have to shoot to wound, in justice to all those poor depositors up in Lawrence, for whom he felt so sorry.