by Oliver Optic
CHAPTER V.
DOWN THE RIVER.
Putting a boat about, as Fanny had turned the Greyhound, is nauticallytermed _gybing_ her. It is a dangerous manoeuvre when the wind isfresh, and should never be attempted by young or inexperienced boatmen.By putting the boat about in the opposite direction, hauling in thesheet as the sail flutters, the danger may be wholly avoided. Theboat's head should always be turned in the direction from which thewind comes. But a person who does not understand the management of aboat should no more attempt to handle one than an unskilful personshould attempt to run a steam engine.
Fanny Grant knew but little about a boat, and it was fortunate for herand her companion in mischief that the wind was not strong enough tocarry the Greyhound wholly over. If she had careened only a littlemore, she would have filled with water and sunk, for she was heavilyballasted. As it was, she was half full of water, and the situation ofthe young ladies, if not perilous, was very uncomfortable.
"O, Fanny!" screamed Kate, in mortal terror, as the Greyhound heeledover, and the water rushed in over the washboard.
"Don't be scared," replied Fanny, with wonderful self-possession. "It'sall right, and there is no harm done."
"We shall be drowned!" gasped Kate.
"No, we shall not be drowned. Don't you see the boat stands up like amajor? Don't be frightened. I understand it all."
"No; you don't know anything about it. The boat is almost full ofwater, and we shall sink to the bottom."
"I tell you she is doing very well. Pooh! that wasn't anything! Sheoften takes in the water like that."
"What shall we do?" moaned Kate.
This was a question which appealed even to Fanny's prudence. Withoutanswering in words, she let go the halliards, and hauled down theforesail. After the boat came about, she had not righted the helm, andthe Greyhound had been thrown up into the wind as she heeled over andtook in the flood of water. She now lay with her sails flapping, andFanny cast off the main-sheet, rather to stop the fluttering than toavoid further peril. Fortunately, this was the proper course to pursue.
"What shall we do?" repeated Kate, expecting every moment that thetreacherous sails would carry them over again, and that they would soonfind their way to the bottom of the river.
"Bale out the water," replied Fanny, taking a pail and a dipper fromthe cuddy forward. "Now go to work, and we shall soon be ready to sailagain."
"I don't want to sail any more," whined Kate.
"Dip away as fast as ever you can. Don't stop to talk about it now."
Fanny took the pail herself, and gave the dipper to Kate, and both ofthem went to work with a zeal which promised soon to free the Greyhoundfrom the burden under which she was laboring. There was a largequantity of water in the boat, and the process of dipping it out wasvery slow. Fanny was afraid that this accident would throw her into thepower of her great enemy, the constable; and this was the only fearwhich troubled her. The perils of the mighty river had no terrors toher while she had a plank under her feet.
Kate was utterly disconsolate and hopeless, and Fanny was obliged touse all her ingenuity to keep her in working condition. To show herconfidence, she sang like a nightingale, as she dipped out the water;and Fanny was an excellent singer. She labored hard to prove to herdesponding companion that there was no danger, and at last shesucceeded in restoring Kate to a tolerable degree of self-possession.
When about half the water had been dipped out, Fanny trimmed the sails,and headed the boat down the river, to the utter consternation of hertimid associate, who was heartily sick of the adventure, and longed toput her feet on the dry land again.
"Now, Kate, you take the pail, and I will use the dipper; I can workand steer the boat at the same time," said Fanny, when the Greyhoundwas under headway again.
"The boat is going down the river, Fanny!" exclaimed Kate, as she tookthe pail.
"Of course she is," replied the bold skipper. "Where did you expect herto go?"
"But you are not going any farther--are you?"
"To be sure I am. Do you think I am going to back out now?"
"We shall certainly be drowned!"
"Nonsense!"
"I don't want to go any farther," moaned Kate, who felt like one goingto execution.
"I can't help it if you don't. I'm going down to Pennville," answeredFanny, still dipping up the water from the bottom of the boat.
"I won't bale out any more then," ejaculated Kate, as she dropped thepail, and looked as though she actually meant what she said.
"Very well; then I won't," added Fanny, throwing down the dipper.
"If you will go back, I will bale out the water as hard as ever I can."
"But I will not go back," replied Fanny, firmly. "Do you think I amgoing home to be shut up for a week, or sent back to my uncle, withouthaving any fun at all? If you won't bale, I won't. I guess I can standit as long as you can."
"Do go back, Fanny," begged Kate.
"I tell you I will not. You don't know what I am going to do yet."
"What?"
"I can't stop to talk about it now. If you don't take the pail and baleout the boat, I will hoist the other sail."
"Don't, Fanny!"
"If you will keep still, and mind what I say, I won't hoist the sail.We go along with only these two sails just as easy as anything can be,and there isn't a bit of danger."
Kate, to avoid the greater evil, submitted to the less; and, as theGreyhound, now going very steadily under her jib and mainsail,continued on her course, she was soon freed from the water within her.The boat went along so well that Kate gathered a little courage, andventured to hope that they might not be drowned, after all.
"You mustn't turn her round again, Fan," said she.
"What shall we do? We shall run ashore if I don't turn her."
"Can't we lower the sails when you turn her?"
"There is no need of that," replied Fanny, cheerfully. "I made a littlemistake before, but I understand all about it now."
"What was the mistake, Fan?"
"I didn't turn her the right way," replied the confident skipper, whohad been studying up the cause of the mishap and had reasoned out thecorrect solution. "I shall know just how to do it next time, Kate, andyou needn't be the least grain scared. See here," said she, putting thehelm down, and bringing the boat round till her head was thrown up intothe wind.
"Don't, Fanny!"
"That's the way it is done," continued Fanny, proudly. "Don't you seehow easily she does it? There isn't a bit of danger now;" and shebrought the boat round to her course again.
Kate was terrified at the very mention of turning the boat; but whenshe saw that the feat was accomplished without upsetting or even takingin any more water, her confidence was in a great measure restored.Fanny's exhibition of her skill produced the intended effect upon hercompanion, and the feminine skipper's easy and self-reliant wayconfirmed the impression. Fanny had learned more about the managementof a boat in that brief half hour than she had ever known before, forthe consciousness that her own life and that of her passenger dependedupon her skill, sharpened her perceptions and quickened her judgment tosuch an extent that those moments of thrilling experience becameequivalent to months of plodding study when the mind is comparativelydull and heavy.
Mr. Long, the constable, evidently did not hurry himself in theinvestigation of Fanny's case; for when he had satisfied himself thatthe wicked girl had deceived him, and had reached the Woodville pier,having first visited the school, as the shrewd girl had intended heshould, the boat was not in sight; or, at least, nothing could be seenof her but the white sails, which he could not identify, and thefugitives were in no present danger on account of his movements. He didnot know whether the Greyhound had gone up or down the river; and hehad no boat in which to follow her.
Fanny felt that she had won a victory, for she did not realize thatsuccess in a wicked cause is failure and defeat. She congratulatedherself on the feat she had accomplished, and she was vain enoug
h toboast to her associate of what she had done; of her skill in managingthe boat, and her shrewdness in planning the enterprise; and it isquite certain that if she had been less resolute and courageous, theexpedition would have ended in failure almost at the beginning.
"But you haven't told me what you are going to do yet," said Kate, whenshe had sponged out the bottom of the well, dried the seats in thestanding-room, and taken her place by the side of Fanny.
"I will tell you now," replied Fanny. "What do you suppose your fatherwill do to you when he finds out that you played truant, and went onthe river with me?" she added, apparently, but not really, avoiding thesubject.
"He'll kill me!" answered Kate, with emphasis.
"No, he won't."
"I don't know what he will do, then."
"He will punish you in some way--won't he?"
"Yes. I don't know what he will do."
"Well, Kate, we must bring him to terms," added Fanny, with the mostimpudent assurance. "If you will mind what I say, he will not punishyou at all. Will you do it?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know! Do you want to go back and be whipped like a baby, beshut up for a week, or something of that kind?"
"Of course I don't."
"And I will tell you how to get rid of all these things, and make yourfather as glad to see you as though you had been a good little girl allyour life, and had been away on a long journey."
"How?"
"That's telling!"
"You said you would tell me."
"And so I will, if you are strong enough to bear it."
"Well, I am."
"Don't go home for a week or ten days. Your folks won't know where youare. When they find out you went with me in a boat, they will think youare drowned; and when you go back, they will be so glad to see you thatthey won't say a word."
It would have been impossible for a girl who had been brought up by aloving mother to conceive of such a cold-blooded and diabolicalproposition. Fanny had no mother, no father. Even the remembrance ofthe former had passed from her mind; and her father, while he wasliving, had been away from her so much that she hardly knew him as aparent. Her antecedents, therefore, did not qualify her to comprehendthe loathsome enormity of the course she proposed to her companion.
"I can't stay away from home a week, let alone ten days," replied Kate,who, bad as she was, was shocked at the proposition.
"Yes, you can."
"Where shall I stay?"
"Stay with me."
"Where will you stay?"
"We will go down to New York city."
"To New York city!"
"That's where I intend to go," replied Fanny, coolly.
"You don't mean so, Fan?"
"Yes, I do; and I have meant it all the time."
"But you said we were going to Pennville."
"We are; and when we get there we will take the cars for New York city.We shall be there before twelve o'clock."
"But what shall we do when we get there?" demanded Kate, who wasabsolutely appalled at the magnitude of Fanny's scheme.
"We will have a good time, in the first place. There are plenty ofshops where we can get cakes, and candy, and ice-cream; we can go tothe museum, the theatre, and the circus; we can go to Central Park, andall the fine places in the city."
"But where should we live?"
"There are hotels enough."
"What should we do at a hotel? Besides, it would take lots of money."
"I've got money enough."
"Five dollars wouldn't pay for our living a week. They ask three orfour dollars a day for living at a hotel."
"I've got more than five dollars," answered Fanny, rather cautiously.
"Have you? How much have you got?"
"I don't know exactly."
"You don't know!" repeated Kate, very confident now in regard to themeans by which the money had been obtained, which, with this addedrevelation regarding the amount, she did not believe had been found onthe floor. "You don't know!"
"I haven't counted it."
"Fan, you didn't find that money on the floor!" exclaimed she.
"I found it, anyhow," said Fanny, turning her head away from hercompanion.
"Where did you find it?"
"In the drawer, if you must know," replied Fanny, desperately.