The Ocean Wireless Boys and the Lost Liner.
by Wilbur Lawton.
CHAPTER I
AT SEA ONCE MORE
The West Indian liner, _Tropic Queen_, one of the great vessels owned by the big shipping combine at whose head was Jacob Jukes, the New York millionaire, was plunging southward through a rolling green sea about two hundred miles to the east of Hatteras. It was evening and the bugle had just sounded for dinner.
The decks were, therefore, deserted; the long rows of lounging chairs were vacant, while the pa.s.sengers, many of them tourists on pleasure bent, were below in the dining saloon appeasing the keen appet.i.tes engendered by the brisk wind that was blowing off sh.o.r.e.
In a small steel structure perched high on the boat deck, between the two funnels of the _Tropic Queen_, sat a bright-faced lad reading intently a text-book on Wireless Telegraphy. Although not much more than a schoolboy, he was a.s.sistant wireless man of the _Queen_. His name was Sam Smalley, and he had obtained his position on the ship-the crack vessel of the West Indies and Panama line-through his chum, Jack Ready, head operator of the craft.
To readers of the first volume of this series, "The Ocean Wireless Boys on the Atlantic," Jack Ready needs no introduction.
Here he comes into the wireless room where his a.s.sistant sits reading in front of the gleaming instruments and great coherers. Jack has been off watch, lying down and taking a nap in the small sleeping cabin that, equipped with two berths, opens off the wireless room proper, thus dividing the steel structure into two parts.
"h.e.l.lo, chief," said Sam Smalley, with a laugh, as Jack appeared; "glad you"re going to give me a chance to get to dinner at last. I"m so hungry I could eat a coherer."
"Skip along then," grinned Jack; "but it"s nothing unusual for you to be hungry. I"ll hold down the job till you get through, but leave something for me."
"I"ll try to," chuckled Sam, as he hurried down the steep flight of steps leading from the wireless station up on the boat deck to the main saloon.
"Well, this is certainly a different berth from the one I had on the old _Ajax_," mused Jack, as he looked about him at the well-equipped wireless room; "still, somehow, I like to look back at those days. But yet this is a long step ahead for me. Chief wireless operator of the _Tropic Queen_! Lucky for me that the uncle of the fellow who held down the job before me left him all that money. Otherwise I might have been booked for another cruise on the _Ajax_, although Mr. Jukes promised to give me as rapid promotion as he could."
Readers of the first volume, dealing with Jack Ready and his friends, will recall how he lived in a queer, floating home with his uncle, Cap"n Toby. They will also recollect that Jack, who had studied wireless day and night, was coming home late one afternoon, despondent from a fruitless hunt for a job, when he was enabled to save the little daughter of Mr. Jukes from drowning. The millionaire"s grat.i.tude was deep, and Jack could have had anything he wanted from him.
All he asked, though, was a chance to demonstrate his ability as a wireless man on the _Ajax_, a big oil tanker which had just been equipped with such an outfit. He got the job, and then followed many stirring adventures. He took part in a great rescue at sea, and was able to frustrate the schemes of some tobacco smugglers who formed part of the crew of the "tanker." This task, however, exposed him to grave danger and almost resulted in his death.
At sea once more, after the smugglers had been apprehended and locked up, Jack"s keen wireless sense enabled him to solve a problem in surgery. The _Ajax_ carried no doctor, and when one of the men in the fireroom was injured, and it appeared that a limb would have to be amputated, a serious question confronted the captain, who, like most of his cla.s.s, possessed a little knowledge of surgery, but not enough to perform an operation that required so much skill.
The injured man was a chum of Jack"s, and he did not want to see him lose a limb if it could be helped, or have his life imperiled by unskillful methods. Yet what was he to do? Finally an idea struck him.
He knew that the big pa.s.senger liners all carried doctors. He raised one by means of the wireless and explained the case. The injured man was carried into the wireless cabin and laid close to the table. Then, while the liner"s doctor flung instructions through s.p.a.ce, Jack translated them to the captain. The result was that the man was soon out of danger, but Jack kept in touch with doctors of other liners till everything was all right beyond the shadow of a doubt.
This feat gained him no little commendation from his captain and the owners. Next he was instrumental in saving Mr. Jukes" yacht which was on fire at sea. In the panic Mr. Jukes" son Tom, who was the apple of the ship-owning millionaire"s eye, was lost. By means of wireless, Jack located him and reunited father and son.
His promotion was the result, when the regular operator of the _Tropic Queen_ went west to receive a big legacy left him. As the services of the retiring operator"s a.s.sistant had been unsatisfactory, Jack was asked to find a successor to him. He selected an old school chum, Sam Smalley, who had owned and operated a small station in Brooklyn and was an expert in theory and practice. The ship had now been at sea two days, and Sam had shown that he was quite capable of the duties of his new job.
An old quartermaster pa.s.sed the door of the wireless cabin. He poked his head in.
"Goot efenings, Yack," he said, with easy familiarity. "How iss der birdt cage vurking?"
This was Quartermaster Schultz"s term for the tenuous aerials swung far aloft to catch wide-flung, whispered s.p.a.ce messages and relay them to the operator"s listening ears.
"The bird cage is all right," laughed Jack. "Dandy weather, eh?"
The old man, weather-beaten and bronzed by the storms and burning suns of the seven seas, shook his head.
"Idt is nice now, all righdt," he said, "but you ought to see der gla.s.s."
"The barometer? What is the matter with it?"
"Py gollys, I d.i.n.k der bottom drop oudt off idt. You may have vurk aheadt of you to-night."
"You mean that we are in for a big storm?"
"I sure do dot same. Undt ven it comes idt be a lollerpaloozitz. Take my vurd for dat. Hark!"
The old quartermaster held up a finger.
Far above him in the aerials could be heard a sound like the moaning ba.s.s string of a violin as the wind swept among the copper wires.
"Dot"s der langwitch of Davy Chones," declared Schultz. "Idt says, "Look oudt. Someding didding." I"fe heardt idt pefore, undt I know."
The old man hurried off on his way forward, and Jack emitted a long whistle.
"My, won"t there be a lot of seasick pa.s.sengers aboard to-night! The company will save money on breakfast to-morrow."
Just then Sam came back from dinner and Jack was free to go below to his meal. He was about to relinquish the instruments when there came a sudden call.
"To all ships within three hundred miles of Hatteras: Watch out for storm of hurricane violence.
"Briggs, Operator Neptune Beach U. S. Wireless Service."
CHAPTER II
WIRELESS CONVERSATIONS
Sam was looking over Jack"s shoulder as the young wireless chief of the _Tropic Queen_ rapidly transcribed the message on a blank.
"Phew! Trouble on the way, eh?" he asked.
"Looks like it. But we need not worry, with a craft like this under our feet."
But Sam looked apprehensive.
"What is the trouble? Not scared, are you?" asked Jack, who knew that, excellent operator though he had shown himself to be, this was Sam"s first deep-sea voyage.
"N-no. Not that," hesitated Sam, "but seasickness, you know. And I ate an awful big dinner."
"Well, don"t bother about that now. Lots of fellows who have never been to sea before don"t get sick."