"If they"d only leave us alone, why, what"s to hinder us mending our own ship, and sailing away out of this, sooner or later?" b.u.mpus wanted to know; after they had been talking the matter over for a long time.
"I suppose you"ll do the mending part, b.u.mpus?" demanded Step Hen, wickedly.
"Well, I"d be only too willing, if I knew how," instantly flashed back the other, "but unfortunately my education was neglected when it came to patching up boats, and tinkering with machinery. I"m ashamed to confess to that, but it"s the whole sad truth. But, thank goodness, we"ve got a scoutmaster who can do the job mighty near as well as any machinist going. I"ll back Thad, yes, and Allan in the bargain, to make a decent job of it. And even Giraffe here might fix things up in a pinch. So long as we"ve got a chance to make the Chippeway Belle do duty again at the old stand we hadn"t ought to complain, I think, boys."
"I"m sorry to tell you that there"s only a slim chance of that ever coming about," Thad remarked, right then and there.
"Then you believe she was smashed worse"n any of us thought was the case; is that it, Thad?" asked Giraffe.
"No, it isn"t that so much as another thing I"ve noticed lately, that"s going to upset our calculations," replied the scout-master.
"Tell us what that might be, won"t you?" pleaded b.u.mpus, with a doleful shake of his head; as though he might be beginning to believe in the truth of that old saying to the effect that "troubles never come singly."
"You may remember," Thad went on to say, "that when you asked my opinion be fore about the boat staying where we left it, I said there was a good chance we"d find her there in the morning if the wind didn"t shift?"
"And now you mean that it"s doing that very same thing, do you?" Giraffe asked.
"If you"d taken the trouble to notice all sorts of things, that you had always ought to as a true scout," the other told him, "you"d have found that out for yourself. The fact of the matter is that when we first reached this place under the ledge the wind seemed to find a way in here, and make the fire flare at times. Look at it now, and you"ll see that it"s as steady as anything; yet you can hear the rush of the wind through the treetops just the same. It"s turned around as much as twenty degrees, I should say."
"And that"s bad for the boat, ain"t it?" b.u.mpus wanted to know.
"I"m afraid so," the scout-master replied; "because it will get the full force of both wind and heavy seas. Long before morning it will most likely be carried out into deep water, and disappear from sight. I think we"ve seen the last of the Chippeway Belle, boys."
"But, Thad," observed Giraffe, "how about that anchor rope? You know we carried it ash.o.r.e, and fastened it to a rock. Would that break, now?
It was a dandy rope, and nearly new."
"Well," said Thad, decisively, "once the seas begin to pound against the boat, with every wave the strain on that rope is bound to be just terrific. It might hold for a time; but mark my words, the constant chafing against the rock, where you fastened the end, will wear the strands until they snap; and then good-bye to our boat."
"Then we had better make up our minds to facing that fact, and not feel very much disappointed if in the morning we can"t see a sign of the Belle," Allan went on to give, as his opinion; for he accepted, the theory advanced by the scout-master as though there could be no reasonable doubt about its being a positive fad.
"What if them fellows took a notion to step in on us to-night, and make us all prisoners of war?" queried b.u.mpus; for this possibility had been working overtime in his brain, and he was only waiting for a break in the conversation to advance it.
"Just what I was going to speak about," Giraffe up and said, somewhat excitedly. "You all sat down on me when I happened to remark about getting a pair of the birds with the gun. I move that we ask Thad to take charge of the firearm, and the rest can load up with whatsoever they can find," and leaning over, he deliberately appropriated the camp hatchet before Step Hen, whose eye had immediately started to look for the same, could fasten, upon it.
"Me too, I second the motion!" exclaimed Davy, in turn making a dive for the long and dangerous looking bread knife, which had proved so handy for many services while on the trip, and was being constantly lost and found again.
"But where do I come in?" asked b.u.mpus, as he saw the favorite weapons of offense and defense taken possession of so rapidly.
"A club will do for you, and Step Hen as well," remarked Giraffe, complacently; "for when a fellow has appropriated the best there is, he can afford to smile at his less fortunate comrades, and a.s.sume a superior air.
"Oh! well, I"d just as soon arm myself that way," the fat scout told them, as he set about finding something that would answer the purpose from amidst the firewood they had carried under the ledge to keep it from getting wet. "I"m a peaceful fellow, as you all know, and think there"s nothing like a good hickory or oak club to convince other people that you"ve got rights you want them to respect. I"ve practiced swinging Indian clubs by the hour; and when it comes to giving a right hard smack, count me in. That"s going to hurt, without injury to body or limb."
At another and less exciting time Giraffe would have surely insisted upon b.u.mpus explaining the difference, between these two sources of injury; but just then he had too much else to bother his head about to start an argument.
"Now, let"s see any three men tackle this crowd, that"s what!" he went on to remark, as he swept his eye proudly over the motley array of weapons; for even Allan had armed himself, having a stout stick, with which he doubtless felt able to render a good account of himself in a tussle.
"But let"s remember," warned Thad, "that we don"t want to let ourselves be drawn into a battle with these poachers, unless it"s the last resort.
They"re ignorant men, and just now they must feel pretty desperate, thinking that we"re going to break up a profitable game they"ve been playing for a long time, carrying their fish to some American market against the laws of Canada, and perhaps smuggling their cargo in, if there"s any duty on fish, which I don"t know about."
"If only you could get a bare chance to talk with one of the lot, Thad,"
Allan spoke up, "I"m pretty sure you"d be able to let them know the truth; and in that way we"d perhaps make friends of them. They might take our solemn promise that we never would give them away, and land us somewhere ash.o.r.e, so we could make our way to either Duluth, or some other place to the north here."
"I"m hoping to get just such an opening, if we can hold the fort till morning; and they haven"t skipped out by then," Thad told him; which proved that he had planned far ahead of anything that had as yet been proposed.
"And meanwhile try to be thinking up any French words you ever heard,"
suggested b.u.mpus, artfully. "Who knows what use the same"d be to you in a tight hole. How"d parley vous Francais sound, now? I"ve heard our dancing-master in Cranford use that more"n a few times, though I own up I don"t know from Adam what she means. But it might make a fellow come to a standstill if he was agoing to run you through, and you suddenly shot it at him."
"Thank you, b.u.mpus, I"ll remember that, though I think it means "do you speak French?" And what if he took me up, and became excited because I couldn"t understand anything he said, you see it wouldn"t help much,"
the scout-master told him.
"But say, what are we meaning to do about standing guard; because I reckon now we"ve got to watch out, and not let them fellows gobble us up while we"re sleeping like the babes in the wood?" Step Hen asked.
"Oh! that can be fixed easy enough, if we all have to stay awake through the whole night. Wouldn"t that be the best plan, Thad?"
It was b.u.mpus who put this important question, but none of them were deceived in the least by this apparent warlike aspect on the part of the fat scout.
b.u.mpus could play a clever game when he became fully aroused; but if Thad guessed what his true reason might be for asking such a question, he did not choose to betray the fact, knowing that it would cause the fat scout more or less confusion.
"Yes, it might be as well for all of us to try and stay awake!" he declared. "As you seem to have settled it that the gun falls to my share, why, I"ll make up my mind not to close an eye the whole livelong night; and if the rest choose to sit up with me and help watch, the more the merrier."
"I will, for one," said Giraffe, stoutly.
"You can count on me to make the try," added Davy.
"Ditto here," Allan went on to say.
"Oh! I"m willing enough," b.u.mpus observed hastily, seeing that several of his comrades were waiting for him to speak; "but I hope that every time anybody just sees me abobbing my head he"ll stick a pin in me; only please don"t jab it too deep, or you"ll make me howl."
"As for me," Step Hen added, "I don"t feel a whit sleepy right now; and my eyes are as starey as a cat"s, or Jim"s over yonder," pointing to where he had managed to fasten the captive owl, which he had persisted in carrying ash.o.r.e, despite the fact that he had about all the burden any boy would care to carry when compelled to wade through water almost up to his neck.
"Well, listen here, then," remarked Giraffe, mysteriously, "I"ve been thinking up a scheme that looks good to me, and I want to know how the rest of you stand when it comes to trying it out."
"Go on and tell us what it is, Giraffe!" exclaimed b.u.mpus, eagerly.
"Yes, if you have thought up anything worth while, we"d be mighty glad to hear about the same," added Allan.
The tall scout looked cautiously about him, and lowering his voice went on:
"Why, I"ll tell you, fellows, what I thought. Now, about that boat belonging to these here poachers, what"s to hinder us from coolly appropriating the same, and starting out to look for the mainland ourselves? Then, you see, it"ll be that bunch that"s left behind to be marooners on old Sturgeon Island; and when we get to town why, we can let the authorities know all about what they"re adoing out here, so they"ll come and arrest the whole kit. Now, what d"ye say about that for an idea, hey?"
CHAPTER XXII
THE LONG NIGHT
"Good for you, Giraffe!" exclaimed b.u.mpus, ready to seize upon the idea without stopping to examine the same in order to find out whether or not it were possible to carry it out.