The Boy Chums in the Gulf of Mexico

by Carol Norton

  CHAPTER XXVI.

  WITH THE BOYS.

  CONSIDERING the misfortunes which had befallen them, the two chumswere in surprisingly good spirits, as they picked their way throughthe marsh, headed South. It was a relief to be free from the dread andapprehension under which they had labored for so many days.

  "I feel almost as though we were on a picnic, instead of beingshipwrecked sailors who have been robbed of their ship, and have lostall except the clothes on their backs," Charley declared.

  "Everything is going to turn out all right after all," agreed Walter,hopefully. "Chris is going to get over his wound all right. He and thecaptain will have no trouble in getting plenty of food and water. Wehad ought to reach Judson by dark, and we'll get a boat or wagon andreturn for them at once. We can easily get from Judson to Tarpon, andthere we can get the United States Commissioner to take up our case,and the minute the 'Beauty' enters port she will be seized and heldfor us. At the worst it will only mean the loss of our diving boat anda little patient waiting. And think of the store of gold which will beours for a little work."

  But his chum was not quite so optimistic. "I do not think that we hadbetter build too great hopes on recovering either our ship or thegold," he observed. "That Manuel is a clever rascal. I fear he willrise to the occasion. He may think that we are wrecked in the stormbut I am convinced he will take no chances. He will plan and scheme tothe last to secure the ship and money and save his own neck from thehalter. He may be caught at last but he will not sail boldly into anyport. He's too wary for that."

  His words did not dampen Walter's high spirits. "There is a revenuecutter at Tarpon," reminded his chum. "As soon as we get to Judson, wewill telegraph to the Commissioner. He will not wait for the 'Beauty'to touch a port if we can put our case strong enough. He will start thecutter out in search of her at once."

  "I hope you are right. If we are going to make Judson before dark,however, we are going to have to travel faster than we are going now.It's slow going amongst this mud and rock. Let us make our way inshoreand see if it's any better traveling there."

  But as they approached close to the mainland they saw that there wasno hopes of easier traveling in that direction. The dense hammockjungle extended down to the edge of the marsh. To make one's waythrough it would be far slower than to continue over the marsh. They,accordingly, retraced their steps to the water's edge. It was slightlyeasier traveling close to the water. The waves had beat down the marshgrass along the edge leaving a kind of beach of rock and mud. It washard and dangerous walking but safer than over the marsh itself, wherethe rank growth hid the treacherous bog holes.

  The boys often paused in their march to examine the masses of stuffthat had been cast up by the waves. The squall of the night before hadrobbed the bottom of great masses of seaweed and had taken heavy tollof the life in the water. Every few minutes the lads would pass greatclumps of seaweed tangled together in beautiful rainbows of brightscarlets, yellows, crimsons and purples. Curiously enough, the stormhad dealt very harshly with the finny tribe. Likely many of the fishhad been caught in shoal water and their lives beaten out against thecruel rocks. They dotted the shore and the chums frequently halted toadmire one's curious shape or coloring.

  "I wonder what kind this one is?" said Walter, pointing to a long slimfish of a beautiful brilliant green.

  "That is a parrot fish," his chum enlightened him. "I think they areone of the most beautiful fishes that swim. They are of all colors,some are violet, some of golden, some scarlet, and in fact, they arefound of every shade and hue. They get their names from their manybrilliant colors, I guess."

  "What a wonderful mysterious thing the sea is," Walter commented. "Inever realized before how much of strange life it contains."

  "What we see along the beach this morning is only a very small sampleof its population," his chum replied. "Sometimes, I think that alllife must have come first from the sea. There is hardly an animal onland which has not a grotesque likeness in some creature of the sea.Take that fish there with the peculiarly shaped head and horns. Itsresemblance to a cow is so striking that it has been named the cowfish. There is another little fish with a head just like a horse. It iscalled the sea horse. Then there is the toad fish, the frog fish, thesnake fish, and hundreds of others closely resembling the animals afterwhich they are named. But here," he concluded, "is, in my opinion, themost wonderful fish I have ever heard of. I have seen many of them butone always has a puzzling fascination to me."

  He had stopped before a flat round-shaped fish which lay strandedin the edge of the water. It was still alive and struggling feeblyto get back into deeper water. It was of a light-tan color and wascovered with spots of darker hue. On its upper surface was a soft,spongy-looking, circular spot It was not a pretty looking object andWalter viewed it with disgust.

  "I don't see anything fascinating about it," he commented.

  "Just put your finger on that soft spongy place," Charley directed,"that's where it's wonderful secret is concealed. It is not poisonous,"he added as his chum hesitated.

  Walter bent down and pressed his finger against the spongy mass. Thenext instant he leaped back with a cry of alarm, shaking his arm madly."Jerusalem!" he exclaimed. "What is it?"

  "Got a shock did you?" laughed his chum. "That's an electrical fish.Their mystery to me lies in where they get the electricity with whichthey are charged. Even a small one like that contains enough to give apowerful shock."

  The morning had been advancing rapidly as they walked and talked andthe sun was shining down hot on their bare heads. Charley, justifyingChris' confidence in him, was quick to recognize the danger from itstorrid rays.

  He cast a look up at the sun. "It is nearly noon," he declared. "Wemust get something to cover our heads with and then find something toeat. I am getting as hungry as a wolf."

  There was nothing along the rocky, muddy beach that would do for hatsand the two bent their steps in towards the mainland. There, they brokeoff small leafy branches and thrust the stems down the backs of theirshirts so that the leaves would tower above, and shade their heads.These made only a poor substitute for hats, but shed off the fiercestrays of the sun.

  Close to where they broke off the boughs was a small running stream andthe boys drank thankfully of its cold sweet water.

  "We have no time to waste in cooking and I fear our bill-o-fare fordinner will be rather scanty," Charley said. "Let's look around hereand see if we cannot find fruit of some kind."

  There were palmetto berries in plenty all along the high bank but thelads had no desire to partake of them except in a case of necessity.Seeing nothing promising along the edge of the jungle, they scrambledup the bank and made their way slowly and cautiously into the hammock,keeping a wary eye out for snakes. They found fruit of several kindsin abundance, but most of it Charley rejected as being poisonous, ornot fit to eat. They gathered two kinds which he declared were bothpalatable and nourishing. One was a golden-red fruit about the size ofa pear. It contained a large nut to which the meat clung closely. Onebite into it and the boys' hands and faces were smeared with stickyjuice. "I would recognize that smeary juice and strong turpentineflavor, anywhere," laughed Walter, "these are mangoes, the fruit, theysay, you have got to get into a bath-tub to eat if you want to keepclean."

  The second fruit was about the size of a large plum and snow white incolor with a blotch of red on the sides. Its meat was sweet, milky andslightly puckering.

  "They are cocoa-plums," Charley explained. "They are considered quitenutritious but I would be afraid to eat a great many of them at a timeon account of their puckerishness. We can eat all we want to of themangoes however, they will not hurt us."

  As soon as their repast was finished the boys filled their pockets withmangoes and cocoa-plums and hastened back to the shore.

  They plodded steadily along while the afternoon wore away, but theirprogress over the rocks and mud was slow and they realized that theywould not be able to reach Judson before darkness ren
dered furthertraveling dangerous.

  They were passing a matted clump of seaweed on the shore when Charley,stopping with a cry of delight, fished out from its midst a round pieceof wood about four feet in length, from which trailed a long, lightline badly frayed in places by the rock.

  "Do you recognize this?" he shouted.

  "No," replied his chum in wonder at his excitement.

  "It's the buoy that marked the place where the gold ship lay. TheGreeks will have a job to locate the gold now. That storm must havechafed the rope in two against a ledge of coral. Hurrah, hurrah."

  "I don't see but that is as bad news for us as for the Greeks," Waltersaid, dubiously.

  "It is, in a way," his chum replied. "Of course it will make it harderfor us to find the exact spot where the treasure lays, but the Greekswill be delayed by it and that will give us a chance to get there withthe revenue cutter and catch them before they get all the gold removedand get away."