CHAPTER VIII
THE DASHING STERN CHASE
NOT a single objection did the man of nerves offer. Ordinarily he mighthave jumped with fear at the proposal to go at fast speed through thefog. Though the mist was already lifting a good deal, as it had done onthe day before, there was still enough of a curtain ahead to make itmore than just risky to go rushing along.
In the white bank ahead the racing boat was already lost to sight.Captain Tom raised his hand to pull the cord of the auto whistle.
“If I show ’em where I am, though,” he thought, at once, “the manhandling that other craft will know enough to swing off onto anothercourse. He can leave me behind easily enough.”
The auto whistle, therefore, did not sound. Captain Tom understoodfully the risk he was taking in “going it blind”—and fast, too—righton this pathway of Long Island navigation. But he made up his mind thathe would very soon begin to sound his whistle, whether he sighted theother craft or not.
“If they haven’t changed their course I’ll soon be in sight of them,”the young skipper reflected, anxiously. “Oh, that this fog lifts soon!”
Having guessed the other boat’s course, Tom could follow it only bycompass, as any other method would be sure to lead him astray.
Both boats’ engines were equipped with the silent exhaust. While notabsolutely noiseless, these exhausts run so quietly that a boat’spresence at any considerable distance cannot be detected through them.
One thing was certain. At present the fog was lifting rapidly. Allwould soon be well if another deep bank of mist did not roll in off thesea.
Jed, watching the gradual going of the fog, was straining his eyes forall he was worth for the first glimpse of that racing craft. EngineerJoe had not further increased the “Rocket’s” speed, for Tom, if he wasgetting somewhat off the course of the other boat, did not want to betoo far away when the lifting of the white curtain should show him theenemy.
“Hist!” The sharp summons caused Tom Halstead quickly to raise hisglance from the compass. Jed Prentiss, standing amidships, for he hadrun back, was pointing over the port bow. Tom could have yelled withdelight, for off there, in the edge of the bank, now some eight hundredfeet distant, was a low, indistinct line that could hardly be otherthan the racing boat.
“Ask Joe to kick out just a trifle more speed, not much,” mutteredCaptain Halstead, as Jed, his eyes shining, moved nearer.
Under the new impulse the “Rocket” stole up on that vague line, whichnow soon resolved itself into the hull of the racing craft.
By this time the chase was discovered from the other motor boat. Therewas a splurge ahead; the hull dimmed down to the former indistinctline. After a few moments the racing craft was out of sight again.
“Crowd on every foot of speed you can, Joe,” was the word Jed passedfrom the young captain. Dawson, crouching beside his motor, waswatching every revolution of the engine that he was now spurring.
And now the fog began to lift rapidly. A thousand feet ahead, drivingnortheast, the racing craft could be made out. She was running a fewmiles away from the coast and nearly parallel with it.
During the last few minutes Eben Moddridge had been strangely silent,for him. Even now, as he stepped up beside the wheel, he was far lessnervous than might have been expected.
“Can you overtake that other boat?” he inquired.
“I’ve got to,” came Captain Tom’s dogged reply, as he kept his gazesharply ahead.
“She seems like a very fast craft.”
“She’s faster than this boat,” replied Halstead, briefly.
“Good heavens! Then she will show us a clean pair of heels,” quiveredMr. Moddridge.
“That’s not so certain, sir.”
Tom was so sparing of his words, at this crisis in the sea race, thatMr. Delavan’s friend felt himself entitled to further explanation.
“You say she’s faster, but intimate we may catch her,” muttered Mr.Moddridge. “How can that be?”
“Motor engines sometimes go back on a fellow at the worst moment,”Captain Tom explained. “That may happen to the other fellow. He mayhave to slow down, or even shut off speed altogether.”
“But that might happen to us, too,” objected Mr. Moddridge.
“It might, but there are few engineers on motor boats that I’d backagainst Joe Dawson,” Halstead continued. “Then again, Mr. Moddridge,the fellow who is steering the boat ahead doesn’t handle his wheel asslickly as he might. By the most careful steering I hope to gain someon him.”
So rapidly was the fog lifting that the skippers of the two boats couldnow see the ocean for a half mile on either side, ahead or astern. Theracing craft, after a few minutes, put on still another burst of speed.
“Ask Joe if he has every bit crowded on?” called Captain Tom. Jedcalled down into the engine room, then reported back:
“Joe says he may get a little more speed out of the engine, but notmuch. We’re pretty near up to the mark.”
So Tom Halstead, whitening a bit at the report, setting his teethharder, devoted his whole energies to trying to steer a straightercourse than did the boat ahead.
“There’s some kind of a rumpus on the stranger,” called Jed. “Look atthat fellow rushing for the hood forward.”
Plainly there was some excitement out of the usual on board thestranger. Jed, snatching up a pair of marine glasses, swiftly reported:
“Someone is trying to fight his way out of the hood, and the others aretrying to force him back. Whee! It looks as though someone had justhurled something out overboard from the hood.”
“Did you see anything strike the water?” demanded Captain Tom.
“It looked so, but it’s a big distance to see a small object, eventhrough the glass.”
“Keep your eye on where you saw that something go overboard,” directedCaptain Tom Halstead. “Try to pilot me to that spot. It may be amessage—from Mr. Delavan.”
It was a difficult task to scan the water so closely. But Jed did hisbest, and, after a few moments, called back excitedly:
“Better slow down your speed, captain. I think I see something dancingon the water. It’s bobbing up and down—something.”
Jed Prentiss seemed almost to have his eyes glued to the marineglasses, so intently did he watch.
“Half a point to port, captain,” he shouted, presently. “Headway, only.Joe, can you leave the engine to bring me a hand-net while I keep myeye on that thing bobbing on the water?”
Dawson leaped up from the engine room, going swiftly in search of thedesired net.
“Half a point more to port, captain,” called Jed. “Steady—so! Thankyou, old fellow”—as Joe handed him the net. Eben Moddridge had nowhurried to the port rail as the boat drifted up alongside the thingthat Prentiss was watching. It proved to be a leather wallet, floatingon the waves. So neatly did Jed pilot that, soon, he was able to leanover the rail, make a deft swoop with the net, and——
“I’ve got it!” he shouted.
Captain Tom Halstead instantly gave speed ahead through the bridgecontrols, trying to gain as swiftly as he could the very considerabledistance that had been lost. “It’s Frank’s wallet—his own. There’s hismonogram on it,” cried Eben Moddridge, his voice quaking.
“See if there is any message inside,” shouted Tom, still keeping hisgaze on that hull ahead, while Joe bounded below to nurse his motor onto better performances.
Mr. Moddridge’s fingers trembled so in trying to open the soaked walletthat Jed took it from him.
“Your friend’s money,” reported Prentiss, taking out a compact mass ofbanknotes and passing them to Mr. Moddridge. “Here are some cards, too,and that’s all.”
“See if anything is written on any of the cards,” Tom directed.
“Nothing on any of them,” Jed quickly reported.
“It’s Frank Delavan’s wallet, though,” cried Eben Moddridge.
“And Mr. Delavan is aboard that boat, a prisoner,” returned TomHalste
ad. “The best he could do was to throw the wallet overboard inthe hope that we’d see it and know where to look for him. There wasonly a small chance of our seeing it, but Jed did, and we won. Confound’em! They seem to be gaining on us!”
As it became more evident that the stranger was gradually pullingfurther ahead of the “Rocket,” Eben Moddridge’s face began to twitch,his breath coming shorter and faster.
“M-m-must we lose?” he faltered.
“No race is lost until it is finished,” Captain Tom replied, tersely.
“But you can’t overtake that boat?”
“It’s a speedier craft than ours, but I’ll follow ’em, even if they gethull down on the horizon,” Halstead retorted. “I’ll keep to the courseif they beat us out of sight. I won’t give up while we’ve any gasolineleft.”
The stranger was now a mile ahead. Tom figured that, in an hour, theother boat’s lead would be very likely increased by four or five milesmore. Surely enough, two or three miles more were gained in the nextthirty minutes. Then—
“Hurrah!” shouted Tom Halstead. “Oh, if it’s only as good as it looks!”
“What is it?” queried Eben Moddridge, brokenly, not even rising fromhis chair.
“See how the other craft is slowing her speed. It looks as though herengine had given out at just the right time for us.”
Indeed, the stranger seemed rapidly coming down to bare headway. Thenshe barely drifted. The “Rocket,” eating up the miles, swiftly gainedon the other motor boat.
“It looks like a real enough break in their engine,” reported Jed, hiseyes once more at the glasses. “They’re rushing about under the hood. Ican see that much. They seem dreadfully bothered about the engine.”
Tom had steered the “Rocket,” by this time, within a half mile of thestranger’s pointed stern.
“_Now_, we’ll run down upon them!” glowed the young skipper.
“What will you do when you _do_ get alongside?” asked Eben Moddridge,tremulously.
The Motor Boat Club off Long Island; or, A Daring Marine Game at Racing Speed Page 8