CHAPTER XX
THE EARTHQUAKE
For a moment they lay stunned by the force with which they had beenflung from their feet. Then slowly, one after another they got to theirfeet, staring stupidly about them.
What had happened? Had a meteor struck the island? Was this thebeginning of wholesale destruction? Then came the answer to theirconfused minds. An earthquake!
The earth was still shaking and quivering beneath them. At any momentmight come another quake that would destroy the island and them with it.A deadly nausea was creeping over them. They felt shaken, sick.
Phil was the first to get to his feet. The earth slithered and slidunder him and he reeled like a drunken man. There came a second shock,less severe than the first but sufficient to throw him from his balanceagain.
As Phil struck the ground for the second time, he became suddenly madclean through. A sort of rage possessed him and he rose to his feetagain, shaking his fist at the elements as if they were some tangibleenemy that he must conquer. Afterward he could laugh at his fury but itwas not funny at the time.
He looked about him and saw the damage wrought by the earthquake. Thetremendous roar that had greeted the first shock had been caused by thewholesale uprooting of trees. Great fissures had opened in the earth andinto these some of the fallen trees had precipitated themselves.
The ground beneath his feet was quiet now and, bringing his eyes backfrom the ruin about him he saw that the other boys had risen and werestanding shakily beside him.
"Gee, what happened?" said Tom, gingerly feeling of a bump on the backof his head. "I thought it was the end of the world that time for sure."
"That's what it was, pretty near, for us," said Phil, quietly. "Look!"and he pointed toward the mountain lifting its threatening bulk againstthe sky. A thin, curling line of smoke was hovering above it, a linethat thickened even while they looked.
There was a gasp of dismay from the boys as they realized what thatsinister film meant. To their suddenly cleared minds it could mean onlyone thing. The mountain was on the verge of eruption!
"Looks as if they'd got us comin' or goin'" said Steve, trying to speaklightly, without in the least disguising his true state of mind. "If theearth doesn't open and swallow us up, the volcano will erupt and buryus. Fine prospect, I should call it!"
It took them a long time to get back to the cave, retarded as they wereby the piled-up trunks of uprooted trees and the yawning fissures in theearth.
And all the way they kept a wary eye on that film of smoke above themountain that grew in volume with every minute. There was no doubt aboutit, the volcano was getting ready for action.
When they came near the cave they saw that Benton and Bimbo were lookingfor them anxiously, and when they appeared Jack looked as though athousand ton weight had fallen from his shoulders and the faithful Bimboalmost wept in his joy.
"I sho did think yo' was a goner that time, Marse Phil," he keptrepeating over and over, pawing over Phil as though he could not satisfyhimself that his young master was really alive and unhurt. "Datearthquake done make so much noise, I done thought you'd gone clean tode bottom of it."
"What--the earthquake?" asked Phil, with a shaky laugh. "Never as bad asthat, Bimbo. Trust this old penny to turn up every time."
Then they talked things over and decided that the only wise thing to dowas to recover the chests from the pirate ship as soon as possible anddesert their perilous position on the island.
"That's all very well," said Steve at the end of their "pow-wow." "Buthow are we going to do anything, I'd like to know, as long as this stormkeeps up."
"It can't keep up forever," said Phil, beginning to recover his cheerfuloutlook, "and if we're not wrecked by earthquake or buried by lava for aweek, we ought to be able to get off with the treasure and our lives aswell. And then for the good old U. S. A. where they don't haveearthquakes."
The boys brightened at this but still were inclined to be gloomy.
"Get away," repeated Dick. "What will we get away in, I'd like to know?"
"We've got our radio outfit," said Phil a bit uneasily, for he wasthinking again of that curling film of smoke against the sky. "If worstcomes to worst we can always radio for help. And," he added confidently,"the worst isn't going to come."
And how could he know what was in store for them?
Just before they turned in that night there came another quake, slight,but just enough to revive the seasick feeling of the afternoon.
Poor Bimbo's panic and dread of the island were steadily growing worseand in the darkness the boys could hear him muttering words that soundedas if he were praying.
"Poor Bimbo," thought Phil as he yielded to the drowsiness that wasstealing over him. "He sure is having a rotten time. We'll have to seethat he gets a--good part--of the--treasure----" And the next he knew hewas opening his eyes to see the sun blazing merrily outside the cave. Itwas the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.
It didn't take him long to get the fellows awake and stirring. It seemedas if the sunshine had some magic in it. Gone were the gloomyforebodings of the night before and as they got into their clothessniffing hungrily at the breakfast Bimbo was getting for them they sangand bandied jokes as if they hadn't a care in the world.
And, except for that patch of smoke that made a dark smudge against thebrightness of the sky, they hadn't. How many fellows, they askedthemselves joyfully, would give their eyes to be in their shoes now. Atreasure of untold riches waiting for them at the bottom of the sea andto-day--_to-day_--they would claim it. Lucky? Well, they'd tell theworld!
And yet as, ready for the great adventure, they stepped outside the caveand their eyes fell on that heavy, lowering cloud of smoke hanging lowabove the mountain, they felt again uneasy and apprehensive.
It would be just as well to hurry the thing through. Bimbo was right.The island was a rather unhealthy place to linger in.
And so they worked feverishly, anxious to salvage the treasure withoutfurther delay. Everything went well with them, seemed to conspire tohelp them.
Once more Phil was lowered to the ocean bed but this time he carried astrong cable, the other end of which was held tightly by the boys somehundred and fifty feet above him.
This time there was no stumbling hesitation in his progress. He had beenthere before. He knew the way!
Straight for the hold he made, careful to keep both the line and cablefree of the wreckage. It can't be said that, as he passed through thecabin where he had first stumbled over the skeleton of the long deadpirate, he did not experience an uncanny thrill. He did but, as he toldhimself with an uneasy laugh, he was getting used to it by this time.Pretty soon he would be able to walk through a whole sea of dead menwithout turning a hair!
Just the same, the chest to which he fastened the cable was not the oneagainst which leaned the second pirate's skeleton. Phil had a weirdfeeling that to disturb it would be to invite disaster upon himself.
Of course when all the other chests had been hauled to the surface, hewould be forced to disturb that awful, reclining figure. But, not yet!
He gave the signal agreed upon that all was in readiness and slowly theheavy chest left its fellows and moved along the littered floor. Philwent with it, sometimes before it, sometimes behind, moving objects outof its way pushing, hauling.
Then came the moment when he stood upon the scarred and mutilated deckof the schooner and watched the chest rise above his head, higher,higher, till he could no longer follow its ascent.
A wild thrill shot through him. By that one act they had conquered thedeep. At last the treasure was within their grasp!
The Radio Boys Under the Sea; or, The Hunt for Sunken Treasure Page 20