“It’s a risky thing to do,” mused the eldest Rover. “We might get caught at it.”
Nevertheless, he was rather in favor of the plan, and when the Merrick party stopped again, for Cuffer to take a stone out of his shoe, they “cut into” the woods and pushed forward with all speed. It was hard work, but they were in deadly earnest, and did not let the vines and brushwood deter them.
“Now, the question is, How are we to scare them?” said Dick, after they had regained the trail, well in advance of Sid Merrick and his followers.
“Let us play ghosts?” said Sam.
“We might black up and play niggers on the warpath, with big clubs,” suggested Tom.
“And get shot down,” interrupted Dick. “No, I think the ghosts idea is as good as anything. Quick, take off your coats and tie your handkerchiefs over your faces.”
The boys had on light colored outing shirts, and these, with the handkerchiefs over their faces, made them look quite ghostlike in the gloom under the trees.
“Now, when the time comes groan,” said Tom “Ghosts always groan, you know.”
“And let us order them back,” added Sam.
“But be sure to do it in very ghostlike tones,” warned Dick. “If our voices sound a bit natural they’ll get suspicious at once. If they come for us, or shoot at us, drop behind the rocks and run into the woods.”
It must be confessed that the boys were doubtful of the success of their ruse. Yet they felt they must do something to hold the treasure seeking party in check, at least until morning. With the coming of daylight they could signal to the Rainbow and with the aid of those on the steam yacht probably rout the enemy.
The Rover boys advanced along the trail until they reached a spot they deemed favorable for their purpose. Then Dick gave his brothers a few more directions.
Presently they saw the rays of the gas lamp and the lantern in the distance. At once Tom set up a deep groaning and Sam and Dick joined in.
“What’s that?” asked Shelley, who was the first to hear the sounds.
“Sounds like somebody in distress,” answered Sid Merrick.
“Thought you said there was nobody on this island?” came from Cuffer.
“Didn’t think there was. Maybe it’s some native who—”
“Look! look!” screamed Tad Sobber and pointed ahead with his hand. “What’s that?”
“What’s what?” asked the men in concert.
“There—that thing bobbing up and down over the rocks?” And Tad Sobber trembled as he spoke. This lonely walk through the darkness of the forest had somewhat unnerved him.
“That’s strange,” muttered Merrick. “It’s groaning!”
“It’s a ghost!” screamed Tad, and shrank back, as did Cuffer and Shelley.
“A ghost?” repeated Sid Merrick. “Nonsense! There are no such things as ghosts.”
“It cer-certainly looks like a-a ghost!” faltered Cuffer.
“It is a ghost!” said Tad, his teeth beginning to chatter. “I-I ca-can hear it gro-groan! Come on ba-ba-back!” And he began to retreat.
“Back with you!” came in solemn tones. “Back with you!”
“No white man must come here,” said a second voice. “This is sacred ground!”
“He who sets foot here dies!” came from a third voice. “This is the burial place of the great Hupa hupa! Back, if you value your life!” And then followed a jabbering nobody could understand, and white arms were waved wildly in the air.
This warning was too much for Tad Sobber, and without further ado he took to his heels and retreated down the trail whence he had come. Cuffer followed him, and Shelley also retreated several yards.
“Stop, you fools!” cried Sid Merrick. “Those are no ghosts, I tell you. It’s a trick of some kind.”
“I—I don’t know about that,” answered Shelley. “Don’t you think it would be better to come here in the daylight? We—er—we can’t find that cave in the dark anyway.”
“Yes, we can—and I am going to do it, too,” was Merrick’s answer. “That is a trick, I tell you.” He raised his voice: “Who are you?” he called out. “Answer me truthfully, or I’ll fire on you!”
This threat alarmed the Rover boys, for they saw that Merrick was in earnest.
“I guess our cake is dough,” muttered Tom.
“Wait, I think I can scare him back yet,” said Dick. “Let me do the talking.”
“I say, who are you?” repeated Merrick. “You needn’t pretend to be ghosts, for I don’t believe in them.”
“We are the owners of this isle,” answered Dick, in the heaviest tone he could assume. “We are ten strong, and we order you to go back to your ship at once.”
“The owners of this isle?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“You can do as you please about that. But if you come a yard further we’ll fire at you.”
“Humph! Then you are armed?”
“We are and we know how to shoot, too.”
“What brought you here at such a time as this?”
“We have a special reason for being here, as you may learn by to morrow.”
“Do you know anything of a treasure on this island?” went on Sid Merrick curiously.
“We know something of it, yes. It belongs to the Stanhope estate, provided it can be found.”
“It doesn’t belong to the Stanhopes at all—it belongs to me,” cried Merrick.
“In a day or two the Stanhopes are coming here to take possession,” went on Dick. “They will bring with them a number of their friends and uncover the treasure, which is now hidden in a secret place. As I and my brothers and cousins own this isle we are to have our share of what is uncovered. Now we warn you again to go away. We are ten to your four, and we are all armed with shotguns and pistols, and we have the drop on you.”
“Good for you, Dick, pile it on,” whispered Tom. Then he pulled Sam by the arm. “Come on, let us appear from behind another rock—they’ll think we are two more of the brothers or cousins!”
“You won’t dare to shoot us,” blustered Merrick, but his voice had a trace of uncertainty in it.
“Won’t we?” answered Dick. “There is a warning for you!” And raising the pistol he carried he sent a shot over the heads of the other party.
“They are shooting at us! We’ll all be killed!” yelled Tad Sobber, who had come back during the conversation, and again he and Cuffer took to their heels.
“Mind the warning!” called out Dick, and dropped almost out of sight behind a rock. At that same moment Tom and Sam appeared from behind a rock far to the left.
“Mind that warning!” they cried. “Remember, we are ten to four!”
“There are two more of ’em,” cried Shelley.
“Confound the luck, what sort of a game is this anyway?” said Sid Merrick, much chagrined.
“Well, it is more than we expected,” answered Shelley. “I, for one, don’t care to risk being shot down. I reckon they have the bulge on us, if there really are ten of ’em.”
“I’ve seen but five the three ahead and the two over yonder.”
“There are two more!” answered Shelley and pointed to another rock, to which Sam and Tom had just crawled. “That makes seven.”
“Go back, I tell you,” warned Dick. “We’ll give you just two minutes in which to make up your mind. If you don’t go back we’ll start to shoot!”
“Come on back!” cried Tad, from a safe distance. “Don’t let them shoot you, Uncle Sid!”
“We’ll go back to our ship,” called out Sid Merrick. “But remember, this thing isn’t settled yet.”
“If you have any differences with the Stanbopes you can settle with the folks on the steam yacht which has just arrived,” answered Dick, not knowing what else to sa
y.
The party under Sid Merrick began to retreat, and Dick, Tom and Sam watched them with interest, until the lights faded in the distance. Then Tom did a jig in his delight.
“That was easier than I expected,” he said.
“Even if we didn’t scare them playing ghost,” added Sam. “I wonder if they really thought we were ten in number?”
“Well, they thought we were seven anyway!” answered Dick. “It was a clever ruse you two played.”
What to do next the Rover boys did not know. It was impossible for any of them to calculate how far they were from the spot where they had landed or to determine the best way of getting back to Foreshow Bay, as they had named the locality.
“If we move around very much in this darkness we may become hopelessly lost in the forest,” said Dick.
“Maybe we had better stay right where we are until morning,” suggested his youngest brother.
“I’m agreeable to anything,” were Tom’s words.
“If we stay here we want to remain on guard,” said Dick. “Merrick may take it into his head to come back.”
An hour later found the three Rover boys encamped in a small opening to one side of the forest trail. They made beds for themselves of some soft brushwood, and it was decided that one should remain on guard while the other two slept.
“Each can take three hours of guard duty,” said Dick. “That will see us through the night nicely,” and so it was arranged.
CHAPTER XXII
PRISONERS IN THE FOREST
Dick was the first to go on guard and during the initial hour of his vigil practically nothing came to disturb him. He heard the occasional cry of the nightbirds and the booming of the surf on the reefs and the shore of the isle, and saw numerous fireflies flit to and fro, and that was all.
“I don’t believe they’ll come back,” he murmured to himself. “Like as not they are afraid to advance on the trail and also afraid to trust themselves to this jungle in the darkness.”
Dick had found some wild fruit growing close at hand and he began to sample this. But it was bitter, and he feared to eat much, thinking it might make him sick. Then, to keep awake, for he felt sleepy because of his long tramp, he took out his knife and began to cut his initials on a stately palm growing beside the temporary camp.
Dick had just finished one letter and was starting the next when of a sudden he found himself caught from behind. His arms were pinned to his side, his pistol wrenched from his grasp, and a hand that was not overly clean was clapped over his mouth.
“Not a sound, Rover, if you know when you are well off!” said a voice into his ear.
Despite this warning the lad would have yelled to his brothers, but he found this impossible. He had been attacked by Merrick and Shelley, and Cuffer stood nearby, ready with a stick, to crack him over the head should he show fight. The attack had come in the dark, the gas lamp and the lantern, having been extinguished when the party from the Josephine drew close.
Merrick had prepared himself for his nefarious work, and in a twinkling he had Dick’s hands bound behind him and had a gag placed in the youth’s mouth. Then he had the lad bound fast to a nearby tree.
In the meantime Tom and Sam were sleeping soundly. The two brothers lay each with a hand close to the other, and with caution Merrick and his party tied the two hands together. Then they tied the lads’ feet, so that they could not run.
“What’s the meaning of this?” cried Tom, struggling to rise, as did Sam.
“It means you are prisoners!” cried Tad Sobber, who had had small part in the operations, but who was ready to do all the “crowing” possible.
“Prisoners!” gasped Sam. “Where is Dick?” he added.
“Also a prisoner,” said Tad, with a chuckle. “You thought you had fooled us nicely, but I guess we have turned the tables on you.”
“I suspected you Rovers,” said Sid Merrick.
“Really!” answered Tom, sarcastically. “You acted it!”
“See here, don’t you get funny, young man. Please remember you are in our power.”
“And we’ll do some shooting, if we have to,” added Tad, bombastically.
“Tad, I guess I can do the talking for this crowd,” said his uncle.
“You were afraid of the ghosts, Tad,” said Sam. “You must have run about a mile!” And the youngest Rover grinned in spite of the predicament he was in.
“You shut up I.” roared Tad Sobber, and exhibited some of the brutality that had made him so hated at Putnam Hall by raising his foot and kicking Sam in the side.
“Stop!” cried the youngest Rover, in pain. “What a brute you are!”
“Leave my brother alone!” came from Tom.
“A fine coward you are, to kick him when he is a prisoner! You wouldn’t dare to try it if he was free.”
“I wouldn’t, eh? I want you to understand I’m not afraid of anybody,” blustered Tad. “I am—”
“Tad, be quiet,” cried his uncle. “I am fully capable of managing this affair. Don’t kick him again.”
“Yes, but look here, Uncle Sid, they—”
“I will take care of things,” cried Sid Merrick, and so sharply that his nephew at once subsided. But on the sly he shook his fist at both Tom and Sam.
“Maybe we had better make sure that nobody else is around,” suggested Shelley, who had been Merrick’s best aide in the capture.
“All right, look around if you want to,” was Merrick’s reply. “I am pretty certain these boys are alone here—although more persons from the steam yacht may be ashore.”
They looked around, but, of course, found nobody else. Then Dick, Tom and Sam were tied in a row to three trees which were handy. Merrick took possession of their single weapon.
“I don’t want you to hurt yourselves with it,” he said, grimly.
“Merrick, this is a high handed proceeding,” said Dick, when the gag was removed from his mouth.
“No more so than was your statement of owning the isle,” was the answer.
“What are you going to do with us?”
“Nothing.”
“I must say I don’t understand you.”
“What should I do with you? I don’t enjoy your company. I am here solely to get that treasure, as you must know. I am going after that and leave you where you are.”
“Bound to these trees?”
“Certainly.”
“Supposing we can’t get loose?” remonstrated Tom. “We may starve to death!”
“That will be your lookout. But I reckon you’ll get loose sooner or later, although we’ve bound you pretty tight.”
“Can I have a drink before you go?” asked Sam, who was dry.
“Don’t give ’em a drop, Uncle Sid!” cried Tad. “They don’t deserve it.”
“Oh, they can have a drink,” said Sid Merrick. “I’d give a drink even to a dog,” he added, and passed around some water the boys had in a bottle.
Less than fifteen minutes later the three Rover boys found themselves alone in the forest. The Merrick party had lit their acetylene gas lamp and the lantern and struck out once more along the trail which they supposed would take them to the treasure cave. The boys heard them for a short distance, and then all became dark and silent around them.
“Well, now we are in a pickle and no mistake,” remarked Sam, with a long sigh.
“That ghost business proved a boomerang,” was Tom’s comment. “It’s a pity we didn’t dig out for the shore, signal to the steam yacht, and tell father and the others about what was going on.”
“There is no use crying over spilt milk,” said Dick. “The first thing to do is to get free.”
“Yes, and that’s real easy,” sniffed Tom. “I am bound up like a bale of hay to be shipped to the South Pole!”
“And the cord on my w
rists is cutting right into the flesh,” said Sam.
“If we were the heroes of a dime novel we’d shoo these ropes away in a jiffy,” went on Tom, with a grin his brothers could not see. “But being plain, everyday American boys I’m afraid we’ll have to stay tied up until somebody comes to cut us loose.”
“Oh, for a faithful dog!” sighed Sam. “I saw a moving picture once in which a dog came and untied a girl who was fastened to a tree. I’d give as much as five dollars for that dog right now.”
“Make it six and a half, Sam, and I’ll go half,” answered Tom.
“Well, this is no joke,” declared Dick, almost severely. “We must get free somehow—or they’ll get that treasure and be off with it before father and the others have a chance to land. We’ve got to do something.”
They all agreed they “had to do something,” but what that something was to be was not clear. They worked over their bonds until their wrists were cut and bleeding and then gave the task up. It was so dark they could see each other but dimly, and the darkness and quietness made them anything but lighthearted.
“Supposing some wild beast comes to chew us up,” said Sam, presently, after a silence that was positively painful.
“We know there are no big beasts on these islands,” answered Dick. “Don’t worry yourself unnecessarily, Sam. We’ve got troubles enough as it is.”
“The only beasts here are human beasts,” said Tom, “and their names are Merrick, Sobber, Cuffer and Shelley,” and he said this so dryly his brothers had to laugh.
Slowly the night wore away, each hour dragging more than that which preceded it. Two or three times the boys tried again to liberate themselves, but fared no better than before, indeed, Dick fared worse, for he came close to spraining his left wrist. The pain for a while was intense and it was all he could do to keep from crying out.
“I’d like to know what time it is,” said Sam, when the first streak of dawn began to show among the trees.
“And I’d like to know if Merrick has found the treasure cave,” added Dick.
“It will soon be morning,” came from Tom, and he was right. The rising sun did not penetrate to where they stood, but it tipped the tops of the trees with gold and made it light enough for them to see each other quite plainly.
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