“No, I didn’t see Dan.”
“He must have been with his father when the landslide occurred,” went on Tom. “And if one escaped more than likely the other did, too. My, how I despise that chap! and have, ever since we had our first row with him at Putnam Hall.”
“I wonder what brought Arnold Baxter back to this section of the country? I shouldn’t think he would dare to come back.”
“He always was daring to the last degree in some matters, just as he is cowardly in others. I would give something to know if Dan is with him.”
“We might follow up the steamer, if it wasn’t for poor Dick.”
The boys talked the matter over for some time, and while doing this the sails of the Swallow were again hoisted, and they turned the yacht back to the vicinity where Dick had gone overboard.
And while Tom and Sam are looking for their elder brother, let us turn back and learn what really did become of Dick.
He was waiting for Tom to come on deck with the lanterns when, of a sudden, something black and threatening loomed up out of the darkness to the starboard of the Swallow.
The mass was the better half of a monstrous lumber raft, which was rapidly going to pieces in the storm.
The raft, or rather what was left of it, hit the Swallow a glancing blow, otherwise the sailing craft must have been stove in and sunk.
The shock caught Dick with one hand off the wheel, and, before he could catch hold again, the youth found himself flung heels into the air and over the Swallow’s stern.
Down and down he went into the lake waters, until he thought he would never come up.
The turn of affairs bewildered him, and he did not come fully to his senses until his head struck one of the timbers of the raft.
He clutched the timber as a drowning man clutches the proverbial straw, and tried to draw himself to the surface of the lake, only to discover, to his horror, that there were timbers to both sides of him, cutting off his further progress upward.
“Must I be drowned like a rat in a trap!” was the agonizing thought which rushed through his brain, and then he pushed along from one timber to another until the last was reached and he came up, almost overcome and panting heavily for breath.
“Help! help!” he cried feebly, and presently heard his brothers answer him. Then the lifeline was thrown, but it fell short and did him no good. By the red fire and the rockets he saw the position of the Swallow, and saw his brothers, but was too weak to even signal to Sam and Tom.
It was with an effort that he at last drew himself to the top of some of the lumber. This movement came none too soon, for a moment later one of the outside chains of the raft broke, and fully a third of what was left of the lumber was scattered in all directions.
“Hullo, Bragin! is that you?”
The cry came from out of the darkness and from the other end of the top lumber.
“Are you calling to me?” replied Dick, in as loud a voice as he could muster.
“Is that you, Bragin?” repeated the voice.
“I am not Bragin,” answered Dick. “Where are you?”
“Here.” And the unknown repeated the cry until Dick located and joined him. He was a burly lumberman of forty, with a heavy black beard and an equally heavy voice. He gazed at the youth in astonishment.
“Hullo! Where did you come from?” he demanded.
“From the yacht this lumber raft just struck.”
“Did the shock knock ye overboard?”
“It did.”
“Humph! I thought ye was Bragin.”
“I came pretty close to being drowned, for I came up under the lumber.”
“Well, we aint out o’ the woods yet, young man. Didn’t see nuthin o’ Bragin, did ye?”
“I’ve seen nobody but you.”
“Then he must be down to the lake bottom by this time.”
“He was on the raft with you?”
“Yes. He and I left the tug to see to the chains when the storm came up.”
“Where is the tug?”
“The raft broke away from her at the fust blow. A fool of a greenhorn was a-managin’ of the thing, an’ this is the result. Come here—it’s safer.”
Dick was perfectly willing to crawl closer to the burly lumberman, who was a good fellow, as could be seen by a glance.
“We’ll be all right, if this section o’ the lumber keeps together,” went on the lumberman. “There are four chains here, so it ought to hold.”
Once safe, for the time being, Dick began to wonder about the fate of the Swallow.
“Did the yacht go down?” he asked anxiously.
“I reckon not, young man. They burned red fire, you know. They wouldn’t do that if there was much trouble aboard.”
“That is true.” Dick was silent for a moment. “I wish I could get back to her.”
“Be thankful that ye aint at the bottom o’ the lake. If we kin outride this storm we’ll be safe enough, for the tug will be lookin’ for the raft when it gits light.”
Slowly the hours wore away, and in the meanwhile Dick learned that the lumberman’s name was Luke Peterson and that he was from the timberlands of Michigan.
“I used to be in the United States service on the lakes, hunting down smugglers between here and Canada,” said Peterson. “But that was years ago.”
“Do they do much smuggling?” asked Dick.
“More than most folks think,” was the decided answer.
The lumberman listened to Dick’s tale with interest. Of course the story had to be short, and was frequently interrupted, as high waves would come along and almost sweep them into the lake. Both lay flat, clutching at the lumber and at the huge chains which held it, and which had thus far refused to part, although the strain upon them were tremendous.
It was about two o’clock in the morning when the storm, according to Dick’s calculation, reached its height. The waves literally drove over the raft from end to end, and it was all both he and Luke Peterson could do to keep on the timbers.
“Hold on tight, young man, if ye value your life!” roared the lumberman. “An’ if the raft parts, stick to the fust timber ye lay hands on.”
Peterson had scarcely spoken when the raft went up to the top of a mighty wave and then came down with a dull boom in the hollow below. The shock was terrific, and it was followed by loud reports as the chains they had been depending upon snapped, one after another. Immediately the lumber loosened up and began to drift apart.
“Take care a’ yerself!” shouted the lumberman, and hung fast to an extra long and heavy log. Dick heard him, but could not answer for fear of getting his mouth full of water. The youth turned over and over, clutched at one log and missed it, missed a second and a third, and then touched a fourth, and clung with a deathlike grip that nothing could loosen.
It was a soul-trying time, and one which poor Dick never forgot. The storm roared all around him, mingled with the thumping and bumping, grinding and crashing, of the sticks of timber. Once his left leg was caught between two sticks, and for the instant he was afraid the limb would be crushed. But then the pressure lessened and he drew the foot up in a hurry. The water washed into his face and over him, and he caught his breath with difficulty. Each instant looked as if it might be his last.
CHAPTER IV
IN THE HANDS OF THE ENEMY
Daylight found poor Dick all but exhausted. He still held to the stick of lumber, but his hands were numb and without feeling, and his lower limbs were in the same condition.
“I can’t stand this much longer,” was his dismal thought. “I’ve got to let go soon.”
He looked around him anxiously. All that met his eyes was the broad expanse of water, with here and there a solitary stick of lumber. He gazed about for Luke Peterson, but the lumberman was not in sight.
“He must hav
e been drowned,” he thought. “Heaven help me, or I’ll go, too!”
Gradually the sky cleared of the clouds, and the hot July sun began to pour down with a glare on the water that was well-nigh blinding. As the waves went down he changed his position on the log, and this gave him temporary relief. Soon the sun made his head ache, and he began to see strange visions. Presently he put out his hand, thinking that Tom was before him, and then went with a splash into the lake.
Almost unconscious of what he was doing, he caught the log again. But he was now too weak to pull himself up. “It’s the end,” he thought bitterly. Then a cry came to him, a cry that seemed half real, half imaginary.
“Hullo, Rover! Is that you?”
It was Peterson who was calling. The lumberman had drifted up on another log, and as the two sticks bumped together he caught hold of the youth and assisted him to his former resting place.
“I—I can’t hold on any—any longer!” gasped Dick.
“Try, lad, try! Some kind of a boat is bound to appear, sooner or later.”
“I—I am nu—numb all over.”
“I suppose that’s true—I’m numb myself. But don’t ye give up.”
Encouraged somewhat by Peterson’s words Dick continued to hold on, and a few minutes later the lumberman gave a cheering cry:
“A steamer! Saved at last!”
The lumberman was right; the freighter Tom and Sam had hailed was approaching, the castaways having been discovered by the aid of a marine glass.
“A man and a boy,” observed Captain Jasper to his mate.
“The boy looks pretty well done for,” returned the mate. “He must be the one that was thrown off the yacht.”
“More than likely.”
As speedily as possible the freight steamer drew closer, and a line was thrown to Peterson.
He turned to give one end to Dick, and then made the discovery that the latter had fainted from exhaustion.
“Poor fellow!” he muttered, and caught the youth just as he was sliding into the lake.
It was no easy task to get Dick on board of the freight steamer. But it was accomplished at last, and, still unconscious, he was carried to a stateroom and made as comfortable as possible.
Peterson was but little the worse for the adventure, and his chief anxiety was for his friend Bragin, of whom, so far, nothing had been heard.
The coming of Dick on board of the Captain Rollow was viewed with much astonishment by two of the passengers on the freighter.
These two persons were Arnold Baxter and his son Dan.
The two had quite recovered from the injuries received in the landslide in Colorado, and it may be as well to state right here that they were bound East in order to carry out a new plot which the elder Baxter had hatched up against the Rovers.
What that plot was will be disclosed as our story proceeds.
“Father, it is Dick Rover,” cried Dan Baxter, after having seen the unconscious one brought on board.
“Hush, Dan! I know it,” whispered Arnold Baxter.
“It’s a pity he wasn’t drowned in the lake.”
“I agree with you. But he isn’t dead, and we’ll have to keep out of sight for the rest of the trip.”
“Humph! I am not afraid of him!” said the bully, for, as old readers know, Dan had never been anything else.
“That may be, but if he sees us he may—ahem—make much trouble for me.”
“On account of our doings in Colorado? What can he prove? Nothing.”
“Perhaps he can. Besides, Dan, you must remember that the officers of New York State are still after me.”
“Yes, I haven’t forgotten that.”
“I wish now that I had put on that false wig and beard before we left Detroit,” went on Arnold Baxter. “But I hated to put them on before it was absolutely necessary—the weather is so warm.”
“Can you put them on now?”
“Hardly, since all on board know my real looks. I will have to keep out of Rover’s sight.”
“I would like to know what he is doing out here.”
“On a pleasure trip, most likely.”
The talk went on for some time, and then Dan approached one of the mates of the freighter, who had just come from the stateroom to which Dick had been taken.
“How is that young fellow getting on?” he asked carelessly.
“He’s in bad shape,” was the answer.
“Do you think he’ll die?”
“Hardly, but he is very weak and completely out of his mind. The hot sun, coming after the storm, must have affected his brain.”
“Out of his mind? Doesn’t he recognize anybody?”
“No, he talks nothing but lumber, and cries out to be pulled from the water. Poor boy! it’s too bad, isn’t it?”
“It is too bad,” said Dan Baxter hypocritically. “Do you know his name?”
“No, but he’s a brother to those boys who hailed us from the yacht a couple of hours ago. A lumber raft struck the yacht and the boy was knocked overboard and managed to cling to some timber.”
“Is the man who was saved his friend?”
“No, he was on the raft and the two are strangers;” and with this remark the mate of the freight steamer passed on.
Without delay Dan told his father of what he had heard. Arnold Baxter was much pleased.
“If he remains out of his mind we’ll be safe enough,” he said. “I presume they’ll put him off at Cleveland and send him to the hospital.”
“I wonder where that yacht is?”
“Oh, we have left her miles behind.”
“And how soon will we reach Cleveland?”
“Inside of half an hour, so I heard one of the deck hands say.”
No more was said for the time being, but both father and son set to thinking deeply, and their thoughts ran very much in the same channel.
Just as the freight steamer was about to make the landing at Cleveland, Arnold Baxter touched his son on the arm.
“If they take Dick Rover ashore, let us go ashore too,” he whispered.
“I was thinking of that, dad,” was Dan’s answer. “Was you thinking, too, of getting him in our power?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t see why we can’t do it—if he is still unconscious.”
“It won’t hurt to try. But we will have to work quick, for more than likely his brothers will follow us to this city,” went on Arnold Baxter.
The steamer had but little freight for Cleveland, so the stop was only a short one.
When poor Dick was brought up on a cot, still unconscious, Arnold Baxter stepped forward.
“I have determined to stop off at Cleveland,” he said to Captain Jasper. “If there is anything I can do for this poor fellow, I will do it willingly.”
“Why, I thought you were going through to Buffalo,” returned the captain in surprise.
“I was going through, but I’ve just remembered some business that must be attended to. I’ll take the train for Buffalo to-morrow. If you want me to see to it that this poor fellow is placed in the hospital, I’ll do it.”
The offer appeared a good one, and relieved Captain Jasper’s mind greatly.
“You are kind, sir,” he said. “It isn’t everyone who would put himself to so much trouble.”
“I was wrecked myself once,” smiled Arnold Baxter. “And I know how miserable I felt when nobody gave me a hand.”
“I suppose the authorities will take him until his brothers come in on that yacht.”
“There is no need to send him to a public institution. I will see to it that he gets to a first-class hotel,” went on Arnold Baxter smoothly.
There was a little more talk, and then Dick was carried ashore and a coach was called.
By this time the freight steame
r was ready to leave, and a minute later she proceeded on her way.
Arnold Baxter and Dan looked around and saw only a few people at hand. In the crowd was Luke Peterson, who now came forward.
“Want any help?” asked the lumberman respectfully.
“You might keep an eye open for that yacht,” replied Arnold Baxter.
“All right, sir. Where are you going to take young Rover?”
“To the Commercial Hotel. I am well known there, and can easily get him a good room and the necessary medical attention.”
“Then, if I see anything of the yacht, I’ll send his brothers up to the hotel after him.”
“That’s it,” returned Arnold Baxter. He turned to the driver of the coach. “To the Commercial Hotel,” he went on, in a loud voice. “And drive as easy as you can.”
Dan was already in the coach, supporting poor Dick in his arms. Arnold Baxter leaped in and banged the door shut. Soon the coach was moving away from the water front and in the direction of the hotel which had been mentioned.
“Of course you are not going to the Commercial Hotel,” observed Dan, as soon as he felt safe to speak.
“Leave it all to me, my son,” was Arnold Baxter’s reply. “We got him away nicely, didn’t we?”
“Yes, but—”
“Never mind the future, Dan. How is he?”
“Dead as a stone, so far as knowing anything is concerned.”
“I trust he remains so, for a while at least.”
The coach rattled on, and presently came to a halt in front of the hotel which had been mentioned.
“Wait here until I get back,” said Arnold Baxter to his son and to the coach driver, and then hurried inside of the building.
Instead of asking for a room he spent a few minutes in looking over a business directory.
“It’s too bad, but they haven’t a single room vacant,” he said, on coming back to the coach. “I’ve a good mind to take him to some private hospital, after all. Do you know where Dr. Karley’s place is?” he went on, turning to the coach driver.
“Yes.”
“Then drive us to that place.”
Again the coach went on. Dr. Karley’s Private Sanitarium was on the outskirts of Cleveland, and it took half an hour to reach it. It was an old-fashioned building surrounded by a high board fence. Entering the grounds, Arnold Baxter ascended the piazza and rang the bell.
The Rover Boys Megapack Page 62