CHAPTER I.

TOM TOPOVER AND HIS RECRUITS.

"What's the use of rigging the boat, Tom Topover?" demanded Ash Burton, with no little disgust apparent in his tones and looks.

"How can you sail the boat if she isn't rigged, Ash?" retorted Tom, who had always been the leader of the "dangerous class" of boys in Genverres.

"We don't want to sail her; we can't sail her in this creek," replied Ash Burton, who seemed to be inclined to dispute the authority and reject the leadership of the Topover.

"What's the reason we can't?" asked Tom, suspending his labors upon an old stick which was to serve as a mast for the craft they were getting ready for service.

"Because there is no room up here to sail a boat. This creek is not more than ten feet wide, and the wind is blowing directly up stream. It is half a mile to Beechwater, as the fellows in the Industrial School call it. The current will carry us down with only a little steering."

"What are we going to do when we get to the little lake? We have nothing but a couple of pieces of boards for oars, and we can't do nothing rowing," argued Tom Topover.

"All we want to do in this tub is to get down to the grove, and then we shall be all right," added Ash Burton warmly.

"We are going to sail down," persisted Tom; not that he cared how the craft was propelled through the water, but because he always wanted his own way, and that his word should be law to his companions.

"You don't know how to sail her after you get her rigged," said Ash, with no little contempt in his tone.

"You do, and that's enough. When we get her into the water, your work will begin, and mine will end."

Ash Burton had recently moved to Genverres from Westport, where he had sailed in a boat a few times, and claimed to know something about the management of one. Half a dozen boys had gathered on the bank of the creek; and they were all the associates, more or less, of Tom Topover, Nim Splugger, Kidd Digfield, and boys of that stamp.

They had heard a great deal about the building of the Lily, the schooner which had been launched by the students of the Beech Hill Industrial School just before the end of the term. The people of the town had talked a great deal about it, and most of them were interested to see her rigged and sailing in the waters of the river and lake. It was well understood that the rigging of the boat was the first thing in order after the school was re-organized in the month of September.

The young ladies in Genverres, and others who had attended the launch, which had been one of the great occasions of the year, had talked with the students; and "rigging the boat" was still the subject of conversation among them. Of course the boys did more talking on this subject than all others. Tom Topover had seen the launch, and heard the subject of rigging the new craft discussed. He was inspired to do something of the same kind, and this explained his persistency in part.

It was the last week in August, and in two weeks the industrial school would be open again; but the students who went to their homes had not yet returned, and every thing was very quiet about the grounds and buildings. A few boys who had no homes, or had them in the immediate vicinity, spent a good deal of their time in the Sylph, the steam-yacht of the principal, Captain Gildrock.

Dory Dornwood had preferred to remain at home with his mother and sister, at the mansion of his uncle the captain. He made a call as often as it was decent for him to do so, at the cottage of Mr. Bristol on the bank of the creek. Miss Lily Bristol, the daughter of the engineer who lived there, was acknowledged everywhere to be a remarkably pretty girl, about Dory's own age.

Dory was a great character at the school, and he was now the captain of the Sylph when the institution was in session. He was by no means a fighting character, though he had been in some hard battles with students and others, and his prowess possibly had something to do with his popularity in school and out.

During the vacation, the Sylph was in service a great part of the time. As she went somewhere nearly every day except Sunday, Dory had frequent occasion to go to the cottage to give the engineer his orders for the next day. His message to the father was generally coupled with an invitation to Lily and her mother to join the party.

Besides, Lily had a brother who had won distinction among the students for certain battles he had fought with Major Billcord and his son Walk. Under Dory's direction, the students had moved the cottage in which the Bristols lived, from Sandy Point to its present location; and this event, in one way and another, had led to a very close intimacy between the young captain of the Sylph and Paul Bristol, Lily's brother.

Perhaps Dory wished to see his friend very often; at any rate, he went to the cottage about every day in the week. Some of the students, and even his sister Marian, were disposed to laugh at him for his frequent visits; but Dory never admitted, even to himself, that he went to see Lily. Being quite young, it is probable that he did not understand the matter very well, and was ignorant of what it was that attracted him to the cottage.

Tom Topover and his followers had been hearing all the talk in the town,—at school, at the taverns, and in the shops,—about the doings at the Industrial School. They had been inclined to imitate, in their own way, the operations of the students on the water. They had endeavored to get into various quarrels with them, sometimes for the simple fun of bothering and annoying them, and sometimes for the purpose of getting possession of their boats.

Twice they had stolen the long barges; and once, when they were assisted by the students of the Chesterfield Collegiate Institute, they had given the owners a great deal of trouble in recovering the property of the school. It is not strange that the frequent view of so many elegant boats on the river and lake inspired them to imitate their more fortunate neighbors in the sports of the water.

Tom and his companions believed that the students and their principal were especially mean and selfish, in keeping all these elegant boats exclusively for their own use. He had done his best in trying to be civil, and even polite, in making his request, for himself and his associates, for the use of some of the boats for an hour or two. He had always been refused; for they were not competent to manage such craft, in the first place, and the principal had no fancy for indulging bad boys.

Being unable to obtain the use even of the four-oar rowboats of the institution, though it was vacation, they had constructed a flat-bottomed affair, which they called a boat, but to which no one else would have had courtesy enough to apply the term. It had been constructed under the direction of Ash Burton, who was certainly a higher grade of boy than the original Topovers; but it may be doubted if his standard of morals was any more elevated. He had been well educated so far, and was now in the high school.

The Topovers were enterprising and daring; and this fact, rather than their coarse manners and disregard of the laws of God and man, had drawn him to them. With him in tone and manners were half a dozen other boys like him, who had joined the Topovers. The old leader had been in some bad scrapes, and the people were generally sorry that he had not been convicted for his assault upon Paul Bristol, on the other side of the lake. They believed, that, in their own State, he would have been sent to a correctional institution.

The addition of boys like Ash Burton and Sam Spottwood had greatly changed the character of the original band. Hearing some of their number speak good English, had led them to improve their own language. But morally, they probably dragged down the recruits quite as much as the latter elevated them. On the whole, however, the tone of the crowd was improved.

The thing they called a boat had been built, and launched with some of the show which had attended the advent of the Lily into her destined element. The next thing in order, according to Tom's idea, was to rig her. It would not be proper to make an excursion in her, if she would float with half a dozen of them in her,—which had yet to be demonstrated,—until she had been rigged. The leader and some of the others had brought such bits of line as they could lay their hands upon, not always with a strict regard to the rights of property.

Ash Burton and Sam Spottwood did not believe in this folly, and they were disposed to rebel against the chief of the Topovers. The old sheet which Tom had brought for a sail would be as useless as a steam-engine without a propeller, in going down Beech Creek.

"If you want to rig her, go ahead, Tom," said Ash, when he had exhausted his arguments against the plan. "Sam and I will wait until you do the job."

"But I don't know how," added Tom. "I never had any thing to do with sailboats."

"Let him have his own way, Ash," suggested Sam Spottwood, in a low voice. "Help him out, and we shall get off all the sooner."

The new boat was not only to be rigged that day, but she was to convey her builders down the stream to the lake. Tom had hacked out a boom and gaff, and had set up the crooked stick which was to serve as a mast. One of the boys had to devote himself all the time to the work of baling out the leaky craft, while another was punching cotton-wool into the gaping seams, and plastering them over with putty.

The mast-hole was so large that the spar would not stand up; and Ash rigged a pair of shrouds to support it in place. The sail had already been bent on the boom and gaff in a very unnautical manner, and a few minutes served to attach it to the mast. The master rigger on this occasion was not disposed to waste any time on the rigging; and the gaff was not made to hoist and lower, but was simply tied to the top of the mast. A piece of bed-cord was fastened to the boom, to serve as the main sheet, and the craft was ready for sea.

But the calker had not yet finished his labors, and Sam Spottwood assisted him. The cotton had but a light hold on the wood, in the wideness of the seams, but the putty kept it in place. In another half-hour, the workmen declared that the boat was tight, and would keep dry, even in a heavy sea, out in the great lake. Ash Burton had some doubts on this point, but he said nothing. If they all got overboard, it would be easy enough to get out of the creek, it was so narrow.

"Is every thing all right now?" asked Tom Topover, in a tone of authority, when the calker announced that his job was finished.

"Every thing is all right," replied Kidd Digfield, who had used the cotton and putty. "The boat is all ready."

Tom proceeded to take his place at the stern.