Homepage
Login
Profile
BookClubs
dmBox
Read Ebook: The Motor Boat Club in Florida; or Laying the Ghost of Alligator Swamp by Hancock H Irving Harrie Irving
Font size:
Background color:
Text color:
Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page Prev Page
Ebook has 1766 lines and 49809 words, and 36 pages
"Going to turn in, Joe?" asked Halstead, as the two chums stood together on the bridge deck.
Dawson paused, as though almost ashamed to voice his thought.
"You think it's going to be a case of all hands on duty all through the night, eh?" laughed Halstead.
"Pretty likely," nodded Joe. "And I guess I'd better tumble Ham out of his bunk. It's time he was going to the galley."
"Yes," nodded Skipper Halstead. "Tell Ham to get the meal on as early as he can. It's going to be rough weather for serving a meal."
As Joe stepped down the short flight of steps to the motor room, a loud, prolonged snore greeted him.
"Come along, now! Tumble out of that!" called Joe, good-naturedly, bending over the bunk in which the colored steward, lying on his back, was blissfully sleeping.
"E-e-eh? W'ut?" drowsed Ham Mockus.
"Get up and get your galley fire going. You want to rush the supper, too," added Joe, half dragging the steward from his berth. "It's just as well to wake up, Ham, and to be in a hurry. You needn't tell the ladies, and scare 'em, but there's going to be a hard blow to-night."
"A stohm, sah?" demanded the negro, showing the whites of his eyes.
"A big one, unless I miss my guess."
"Fo' de Lawd's sake, sah!" gasped the colored steward. "An' in dis little bit uv a gas-tub, at dat!"
"Avast there!" growled Joe. "I'll kick your starboard light overboard if you call this craft names. You'd better understand, Ham, that the 'Restless' is as good as a liner."
"Will you quit calling our boat hard names, and get your fire started?" demanded Joe Dawson, scowling, and taking a step toward the negro.
"Yes, sah! Yes, sah!" exclaimed Ham, moving fast. But there was a wild look in his eyes, for Ham was a sea-coward if there ever was one. Though he started the galley fire, and made other moves, the steward hardly knew what he was doing.
"Er stohm comin'--a reg-lar hurricane, an' dis yere niggah ain' done been inside er chu'ch in a month!" Ham groaned to himself.
As Joe Dawson returned to the bridge deck he noted some increase in the haze to the southward. The wind, too, was kicking up a bit more, though as yet the sea was running so smoothly that a landlubber would never have suspected that the "Restless" was moving in the track of dire trouble to come.
"Can you take the wheel just a moment, old fellow?" requested Tom Halstead. "I don't want to bother our passengers, but, now that both ladies are on deck, I want to go below and make sure that the stateroom port-holes are tightly closed."
Mr. Tremaine was now talking to the ladies, Dixon having vanished. Tom went through the passage connecting the motor room with the cabin. As he went he stepped as softly as usual. Even in turning the handle of the door into the cabin he made no noise. And so, quite unexpectedly, the young skipper came upon Oliver Dixon.
Dixon stood at the cabin table, facing aft. In one hand he held a vial of water, or what appeared to be water. Now, he lifted a paper containing whitish crystals, all of which he emptied into the vial, corking the container and giving the mixture several shakes.
Holding the bottle up to the light, in order to make sure that all the crystals had dissolved, Dixon happened to turn enough to see Captain Halstead.
"Confound you, boy, what are you doing there?" gasped Dixon, becoming suddenly so excited that he dropped the bottle to the soft carpet.
Tom flushed at the use of the word "boy." On his own craft he was wholly entitled to be called "captain." But he replied, steadily:
"Pardon me, Mr. Dixon, but I saw you doing something with the bottle, and I waited so that I wouldn't take the risk of jogging your elbow in passing you."
Oliver Dixon, a little pale about the mouth, and with a suspicious look in his eyes, stared at the young sailing master.
"Well, what are you doing here, anyway?"
The tone and manner were so offensive that Halstead flushed in earnest this time, though he answered, quietly enough:
"Pardon me, Mr. Dixon, but as commander and part owner, I don't have to explain my presence in any part of this craft."
"You were spying on me!" hissed the other, sharply.
Tom Halstead opened his eyes very wide.
"I might ask, Mr. Dixon, whether you are in the habit of doing things that would interest a spy?"
Dixon drew in his breath sharply, first flushing, then all the color leaving his face. But the young man was quick to feel that he was making matters worse.
"Don't mind me, Halstead," he begged, quickly. "You startled me, and I hardly know what I'm saying. I--I--I--am South for my nerves, you know."
"No; I didn't know," replied Skipper Tom, quietly. He felt a good deal of wonder at the statement, for Oliver Dixon looked like anything but a nervous wreck.
"You--you won't mention this?" begged the young man, bending to pick up the vial, which he thrust into a vest pocket.
"Why, I don't see anything either to tell or to conceal," remarked Captain Halstead.
"I--I don't want Miss Silsbee--or the Tremaines, either, for that matter, to know that I'm so--so nervous," almost stammered Oliver Dixon.
"I'm not in the habit of carrying tales of any kind," retorted the youthful skipper, rather stiffly.
He passed on to the staterooms at the after end of the cabin. Dixon followed him with a scowl full of suspicion and hate. Could Halstead have seen that look he would have been intensely astonished.
"The steward isn't setting the dinner table so soon, is he?" asked Mrs. Tremaine, in her usual languid voice.
"Yes, madam."
"But I thought we had made it plain that we didn't want dinner served, any night, earlier than seven o'clock."
"There's a reason, to-night, Mrs. Tremaine," replied Skipper Tom, standing there, uniform cap in hand. "It is best to have the meal over early because--well, do you see the sky to the southward?"
The haze at the lower horizon had spread into a darkening cloud that was overtaking the boat.
"Are we going to have a storm?" asked Mrs. Tremaine, in quick apprehension.
"Well, a bit of a blow, anyway," admitted the young captain. "It may prove, Mrs. Tremaine, to be just a little kink out of the Gulf Stream, which we are now leaving."
"Is it going to be one of the ugly, southerly December gales which I've read cross the Gulf of Mexico with such violence?" asked Ida Silsbee, turning around quickly.
"We'll hope it won't be much," replied Captain Tom, smiling. "You can see that I don't look very worried."
"Oh, you can't fool me, Captain Halstead," cried Mrs. Tremaine, rising from her chair with what was unusual haste for her. "You know more than you are telling! Things are going to happen to-night!"
More things, indeed, than Captain Tom Halstead yet dreamed!
Before Skipper Tom had turned to walk forward a long, rolling wave, a foretaste of the weather to come, had rolled in from the south, causing the "Restless" to take a plunge. A shorter wave followed, rocking the craft noticeably. In an instant the colored steward's head was poked up through the companionway.
Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page Prev Page