by Morgan Scott
CHAPTER XIV.
THE HAUNTED ISLAND.
Luck did not seem to favor the anglers, for, though they paddled alongthe shores, casting into the shadows, and varied this by trying deeperwater, the sun had set before they got a single rise. At last, however,there was a swirl as Crane lightly dropped a “Morning Glory” as far ashe could send it from the canoe, and the buzz of the reel made thehearts of both lads jump.
“I’ve got one—by jinks! I’ve got one,” palpitated Sile.
“You haven’t got him yet,” said Sleuth. “He’s hooked, but you can’t besure of him until we dip him into the canoe.”
“Ginger! see him go,” cried Crane. “He must be a bouncer. Grab thepaddle, Pipe, and follow up.”
Having reeled in, Sleuth did as directed, and at the first dip of hisblade the boys saw the fish leap clear of the water, with a tremendousslap, as it tried to shake the hook free. With a splash, he fell backand took to running again.
“Shades of the Pilgrim Fathers!” gasped Sleuth in envious admiration.“He’s a monster. He’s the father of them all. Why didn’t I have the luckto hook him?”
“It’s a salmon, and a peach,” fluttered Crane, reeling in as the fishyielded. “Have that net ready, Pipe.”
“No hurry,” returned Sleuth wisely. “Don’t you get the idea that thatfellow is going to let us dip him in a hurry. You’ve got your work cutout for you for some time, old man.”
He was quite right about this, for the gamey fish fought like a shark,resorting to all the devices and stratagems of its kind. Time after timethe salmon leaped high out of the water, and whenever it did so bothboys were filled with apprehension until the tautening of the line againtold them that the creature had not broken away. At least twenty minuteswere consumed in the delightful, nerve-racking task of playing thatfish, and Crane repeatedly brought him close to the canoe, only to havehim turn and run with a fresh burst of strength and a persistence thatthreatened to leave the reel bare of line. At last, however, with thesoft twilight thickening, the salmon betrayed unmistakable evidence ofweariness. Slowly and resentfully it permitted itself to be broughtcloser, its efforts to run becoming shorter and weaker. Grasping thebamboo handle of the landing net, Piper awaited the proper moment, readyto dip.
“Work easy, Sile—work easy,” entreated Piper. “Don’t let him fool you.He may be playing possum.”
“Jest yeou be ready to do yeour part of the job,” advised Crane. “That’sall I want of yeou.”
To Sleuth’s credit, he did his part well, and the very first dip of thenet secured the salmon, who came out of the water writhing in the meshesand shining beautifully, despite the semi-darkness.
“Bate he weighs five paounds,” exulted the triumphant angler, removingthe capture from the net. “Oh, say, Sleuth, what do you think of that!Them fellers that ketched a little mess of brook traout this morning arebeat to death.”
Sleuth had nothing to say. He sat there in the bottom of the canoegazing dejectedly at the beautiful fish, his heart heavy with chagrinbecause his was not the glory of the capture.
“But there may be others around here,” he suddenly exclaimed. “PerhapsI’ll get the next one.”
“Do you realize that it’s dark and we’re clean over on the side of thelake opposite aour camp?” asked Sile. “It’s too late to fish any moretonight, old feller, and we’d better be hikin’ for Pleasant Point.”
“That’s it!” rasped Sleuth. “That’s the way of it! You don’t want me tocatch anything. You want to hustle back with this big fellow, so thatyou can crow over me.”
“Oh, flumydiddle!” retorted the other boy. “Yeou can see for yourselfthat it’s gettin’ too dark, and we’ve got a long distance to go. Thefellers will be worried abaout us if we don’t git in pretty soon.Yeou’ve got some sense; anyway, we told Granger that you had.”
Piper yielded with poor grace, and when the canoe was headed towardPleasant Point there was little vigor in his strokes. He had boasted ofhis skill as an angler, and, returning empty-handed with a companioncrowned with victory, he seemed even now in fancy to hear the jibes ofthe three lads who were waiting at Camp Oakdale.
Crane made no complaint, even though he realized that the canoe wasbeing propelled almost wholly by his paddle; really generous, althoughinclined to practical jokes, Sile was sorry for Sleuth.
The rekindled fire was blazing on Pleasant Point, and this light guidedthem. Presently, near at hand and only a short distance away, a woodedisland loomed in the darkness.
“Gee!” said Crane in a suppressed voice. “That’s Spirit Island. We’repretty close.”
“Yah!” Piper flung back. “You’re scared, I’ll bet.”
“No, I ain’t,” denied the other boy stoutly. “I didn’t take no morestock in the ghost part of Granger’s yarn than yeou did, not a bit. Say,if we had time I’d jest as lief land on that island right naow.”
“I dare you!” challenged Sleuth. “Come on.”
“But yeou know we ain’t got time.”
“We can just step ashore for a minute, and then we’ll have thesatisfaction of telling the fellows at camp what we did. It won’t takemore than a jiffy or two.”
Crane, however, continued to protest, which seemed to make hiscanoe-mate all the more set upon the project. They had paused a momentin their paddling, and Piper, dipping his blade, swung the frail crafttoward the near-by shore, beyond which the dark, gloomy pines could beseen standing thickly a rod or more from the water’s edge.
“I’m going to put my foot on that island tonight,” declared Sleuth. “Therest of you had lots of fun with me last night, but I’ll show you that Iain’t afraid of——”
He stopped suddenly, the paddle upheld and dripping. Seemingly from themidst of the black pines came the long-drawn, mournful howling of a dog,and that sound, so doleful, so eerie, sent a shivering thrill throughboth lads.
“Great Jehosaphat!” gasped Crane.
“Did you hear it?” whispered Piper.
“Think I’m deef? Course I heard it.”
“It was a dog.”
“Mebbe it was.”
“Of course it was. Don’t you know the howling of a dog when you hearit?”
“I know the howlin’ of any ordinary dog, but somehaow that saoundeddifferent to me.”
“Different? What do you mean?”
“Why,” faltered Sile, “it—it was—was sort of spooky, yeou know. Didn’tsaound just like the howlin’ of any real live dog I ever heard.”
“But,” protested Piper, “it had to be a live dog, you know; it couldn’tbe anything else.”
“Perhaps,” suggested the other boy, with a touch of mischief, “it was acougar.”
“This is a fine time to try to crack any stale chestnuts,” flung backSleuth. “I’d really give something to know just what it was we heard.”
“Perhaps,” returned Crane, confident now that his companion had lost alldesire to make an immediate landing on the island, “we might find aoutby goin’ ashore and prowlin’ araound in them dark woods. Come on.”
But now it was Sleuth who objected. “There isn’t time, you chump; we’vegot to get back to the camp. Only for that, I’d be willing to——”
He was interrupted again by a repetition of that protracted, mournfulhowling, which seemed to echo through the black pines and apparentlyproceeded from a point much nearer than before. The sound of a realflesh-and-blood dog howling mournfully in the night and in a lonelyplace is enough to give the least superstitious person a creepy feeling,and, with the tragic story of the hermit and his faithful dog fresh intheir minds, it was not at all remarkable that the two lads should nowfeel themselves shivering and find it no simple matter to keep theirteeth from chattering.
“The confaounded critter is coming this way!” whispered Sile excitedly.
“We’re pretty near the island, aren’t we?” returned Sleuth. “Let’s begetting along toward camp.”
“If we do,” he said, “mebbe we’ll see something.”
“Lot of good that will do us,” hissed Sleuth. “And there’s a big chanceof seeing anything in this darkness, isn’t there? I thought you wantedto get to the camp?”
“And I thought _yeou_ wanted to land on the island. Yeou don’t believein spooks, yeou know.”
“What’s that got to do with it? Think I want to be chewed up by ahungry, vicious dog? I’m no fool.”
“Mebbe not,” admitted Crane, in a manner not at all intended to soothethe other boy. “Public opinion is sometimes mistaken abaout folks.”
Sleuth dipped his paddle nervously into the water.
“I’m hungry, anyhow,” he declared. “They’ll have supper waiting for us.It will spoil.”
“Look!” sibilated Sile, crouching a bit and lifting his arm to pointtoward the island. “I can see something! There’s something movin’! Seeit, Pipe—see it?”
Out from the edge of the pines, faintly discernible through thedarkness, came something white which plainly resembled a dog. As bothlads stared, motionless, at this thing, it seemed to squat upon itshaunches, and, with lifted muzzle, it sent out across the water arepetition of that fearsome howling.
“It’s the spirit of Old Lonely’s dog!” panted Crane. “Sure as shootin’it is, and we’ve both seen and heard it.”
“See! See!” fluttered Piper in a perfect panic. “There’s something elsecoming out of the woods! It’s a man!”
Slowly, like a thing materializing from thin air, a white figureresembling a human being appeared before their staring eyes. It remainedstanding close to the border of the dark pines, motionless, but seemingto become more and more distinct as they stared at it in stony silence.And now their teeth were chattering, beyond question.
“I guess you’re right, Sleuth,” Crane finally gulped; “that supper willspile if we don’t get to camp as soon as we can.”
With something like frantic haste and vigor they wielded the paddles.