CHAPTER XII
SHIPWRECKED
"That looks promising," said Benton. "Let's explore it and see if itamounts to anything," and suiting the action to the word, he dropped tohis knees and crawled into the narrow passage, that was barely wideenough to admit his broad shoulders. The others followed close behind,all except Bimbo, who preferred to wait in the open air.
"Dere's no tellin' whut kind ob a conjur dere may be in dat place, an'Ah 'lows Ah'll stay outside," he declared, with chattering teeth, and noamount of persuasion could get him to follow the others.
For their part, they were willing to risk worse things than 'conjurs' tofind a place where they could dry out, and they had not gone far whentheir persistence was rewarded. After about twenty feet the narrowpassage widened out into a roomy cave, with a floor of hard dry sand. Afaint light trickled down through some opening above, so that they coulddimly make out the interior. In one corner were the remains of a rudestone fireplace, and the little party were delighted with theirdiscovery. There were even a few sticks of wood lying beside thefireplace, rotted and crumbling, but ideal material for starting a fire.Luckily Benton had a small waterproof box of matches on his person, andin a few minutes they had a fire snapping and crackling in the ancientfireplace. It flickered and danced on the rough stone walls, castinggrotesque shadows as they all crowded about it and absorbed some of itswelcome warmth. Phil went back to fetch Bimbo, and after much persuasiongot him to enter the narrow passage. The negro's eyes rolled as he sawthe red glint of the fire at the further end, but Phil had craftily madehim go first, so that there was no chance to retreat. But when hefinally reached the big cave, which was already filled with the cheerywarmth from the fire his fear changed suddenly to joy, and he caperedabout, executing impromptu jig steps and clapping his hands.
"Ef Ah only had somethin' heah to cook, A'd turn you geemmen out a mealdat would make you hair curl, yessah, dat Ah would," he declared, withan expansive smile.
"Yes, and if we only had some ham, we could make some nice hamsandwiches if we had some bread," said Tom, sarcastically.
"Yessah, dat we could," agreed Bimbo, utterly missing the sarcasm, toTom's great disgust. "Specs we'll have to tote some outn de old shipwhen de storm done goes down."
"Yes, I don't think it will take me long to get sick of clams as asteady diet," agreed Phil. "But we're lucky to have a dry place likethis. Br-r-r! I never knew it could be so cold in this part of theworld."
"Wait until the sun comes out, and you'll wonder how you could ever havefelt cold," Benton assured him. "This isn't half bad, though," hecontinued. "We'll make this place our headquarters, and sleep here atnight. We can easily block the entrance and make it safe against anyintruders."
"I don't imagine there's anybody on this island to bother us, is there?"inquired Steve, in some surprise.
"That's an open question," said Benton. "These islands are often visitedby savage natives, and we can't afford to take any chances. In fact,somewhere in his papers the old Spaniard mentions some such visit, ifyou'll remember."
Steve nodded, and they all agreed to use every precaution againstsurprise. By this time their clothes were beginning to dry out, and theyfelt very sleepy and comfortable. The smoke from the fire drifted up tothe roof and disappeared through an opening there, leaving the air belowcomparatively clear. When their clothes were quite dry, they rolled acouple of big rocks across the entrance to the cave, and then, scoopingout hollows in the soft dry sand, they lay down and were soon fastasleep.
Phil was awakened by a shaft of brilliant sunlight that pierced downthrough the opening in the roof and glided over the sandy floor until itreached his eyes. He leaped to his feet, and the others, awakened by hisaction, sat up, yawning and rubbing their eyes.
"Hooray!" shouted Tom. "The sun's shining again, so the storm must beover."
"How did you ever guess it?" grinned Phil, and made for the entrance,followed by the others.
They stepped into a different world from the one they had left theprevious evening. Brilliant sunlight trickled down through the thickfoliage, rousing joy in the breasts of countless birds, who flittedabout among the branches like living rainbows, so gaudy was theirplumage. The boys rushed down to the beach, and gazed anxiously fortheir vessel. Had it been destroyed during the night they would havebeen in a sorry plight indeed, but on the contrary it had survived thepounding of the waves, which had only succeeded in forcing it closer tothe beach. The tide was also low, and had the little vessel not beencanted at such an angle, they might have imagined that it was stillafloat. The surf still roared on the outer reef, but the wind haddisappeared, and the water about the Fleeting had scarcely a ripple uponit.
"Things might be a lot worse," declared Benton. "One of us will have toswim out to the wreck, and either get one of the boats, or make a raft,if they've all been smashed."
"It doesn't look like much of a swim," said Dick. "I could make it infifteen minutes."
"The swim doesn't amount to much," agreed Benton. "Don't forget, though,that these waters are full of sharks, and it's dangerous to venture morethan a few feet from the beach. I suggest that we all draw lots to seewho goes."
"I'll take a chance," declared Phil, and before they could stop him hehad thrown off his coat and shoes and was in the water. He used a fastcrawl stroke that took him through the water at surprising speed, butnone the less his friends on shore watched his progress anxiously, andheaved sighs of relief when they saw him seize a trailing rope and haulhimself up on deck.
Once there, he found everything in a terrible state of devastation. Thedeck was strewn with wreckage. The after deck house had been swept awayentirely, while the forward one was badly damaged. But by great goodfortune a large quantity of food that was stored here, where the galleyhad also been, was almost undamaged. Phil caught up a handful of seabiscuits from a big tin, and munched them ravenously while he exploredfurther.
All the boats but one had been swept away and even this one had twoplanks stove in near the bow. But Phil got hammer and saw out of thecarpenter's chest, and after two hours of hard work had the boat patchedup so that it would float. The boat was a serviceable twenty foot dory,and Phil felt thankful that it had survived the general disaster.
After great exertion he contrived to get the boat into the water, andthen proceeded to load it with provisions, together with a few toolsfrom the chest. The improvised repair leaked slightly, but Phil soon hadall that he cared to transport at one load, and set out for the beach. Acheer greeted him as the bow grated on the sand, and they all fellravenously on the food that he had brought.
After their appetites had been satisfied, they all piled into the boatexcept Bimbo, who was detailed to carry the supplies to the cave. Onceon board the Fleeting they set about salvaging everything that theycould. They found the diving apparatus undamaged, and to their surpriseand unbounded delight they discovered that the radio outfit had not beendestroyed, although of course it was soaked and required much drying outbefore it would be serviceable again. Fortunately the batteries had beenlocated in a rack quite high up on the wall, and the vessel had settledin such shallow water that the sea had not reached them.
They carried the diving apparatus and radio set on deck, and loaded itinto the dory. This made a pretty heavy load for the damaged boat, andthey were unable to carry anything else on that trip. But on succeedingjourneys they took ashore food, clothing, and other much neededsupplies, until by nightfall their cave was stocked with enoughprovisions to last them a month if necessary.
The possession of the radio set filled them with delight, for with itthey knew that they could get in touch with civilization and summon helpshould they need it. They carried the outfit to the cave, where Bimbohad prepared a supper worthy of the appetites they brought to it. Aftersupper they set themselves to drying out the induction coils,variometers, and other parts of the apparatus before the fire. When theyreflected what a change for the better
the last twenty four hours hadwrought, they felt encouraged and hopeful of the future.
"To-morrow we'll spend getting off the rest of the stores," proposedBenton, "and then we can turn our attention to locating the treasure.We'll caulk the dory and make it perfectly tight and then we'll try torig up the diving apparatus in it, although I'm afraid it will be rathersmall."
"I've been thinking about that," said Phil. "And I'm pretty sure thatwe'll never be able to carry on diving operations from the dory. Itseems to me we'd do better to build a big raft, and mount the apparatuson that. We could tow it out through the passage in the reef easilyenough."
"That sounds like a crackerjack idea to me," said Dick,enthusiastically, and the others agreed with him. So it was decided totry out this plan as soon as they got all the supplies off the Fleetingthat they would be likely to require.
The construction of the raft was a difficult operation, but at last theyhad it finished, and Phil and Benton embarked in the dory to go on ahunt for the wreck, while the others attended to mounting the windlasson the raft.
The Radio Boys Under the Sea; or, The Hunt for Sunken Treasure Page 12