Chapter 13

"Not a chance in a thousand. It's too rough for the lookout to spy our boat, and, even if the steamer should come close, we could never make her hear. She's either a tramp or an ocean liner from Halifax for Portland."

On she plowed unswervingly and majestically, straight toward them.

"I'm afraid she's coming too near for comfort," said Jim, anxiously. "She might run us down and never know it. Lots of fishermen have gone that way. Ship that oar in the scull-hole. I'm going to haul in the drug."

He lifted the trawl-tub aboard and sprang quickly aft.

"We'll know pretty quick whether she's likely to pass ahead or astern. We can't count on being seen. We've got to look out for ourselves."

Freed from its floating anchor, the dory bobbed wildly. Wielding his oar skilfully, Spurling held her bow to the north, ready to scull for the last inch, or to let her drop back, as the approach of the steamer might make it advisable.

Closer and closer came the big boat; her lights oscillated with pendulum-like regularity as she rolled on the heavy seas.

"She'll pass astern," was Jim's verdict. "Won't do to drift in front of her."

He sculled strongly, keeping an anxious eye on the threatening monster. Percy's hair bristled.

"Harder, Jim!" he shouted. "She's going to run us down! Steamer ahoy! Keep off! Keep off!"

The rushing foam smothered his cries. Meanwhile Spurling worked like a steam-engine. Two lives hung on his oar-blade.

As the knife-like stem sheared past, close astern, the green eye disappeared; the red glared menacingly down from the huge bulk looming overhead. Then the lofty black side swept by, flashing an occasional ray from a lighted port-hole. The screw gave them a sickening moment, but they soon tossed safely astern, breathing hard, eyes on the dwindling leviathan, wallowing westward.

Jim spoke first: "Close as they make 'em! I'm glad that's over!"

Percy agreed with all his heart. Jim had discovered that the tub was becoming a bit shaky, so he reinforced the lanyard, and strengthened the bottom by binding it with ground-line. Before long it was towing again in front of the bow, as good as new.

Hours passed, but the intensity of the gale did not slacken. The sea was frightfully rough. It kept the boys bailing continually.

Dawn broke at last. On the eastern horizon grew a pale light, against which the ragged, savagely leaping crests were silhouetted weirdly. It brightened to a crimson glow, and soon the sun was shooting its fiery arrows across the heaving, glittering waste.

The forenoon wore slowly on as they drifted steadily south. The water around the dory was alive with whirlpools. Gigantic green seas rushed down as if to overwhelm her, but she flirted her bow aloft and rode them stanchly.

Percy, glancing to starboard, saw a black fin cutting the slope of a watery ridge.

"Shark, Jim?"

"Yes. And there's another to port. They're looking for trouble. They'll stick by till we're out of this scrape or in a worse one."

He was right. The sun reached its zenith and began to descend, but still the black fins wove their ceaseless circles round the boat.

Jim had been scanning the sea, hand over his eyes.

"There's a schooner," he remarked, without enthusiasm.

Percy was all excitement.

"Where? Where?"

"Up there, two miles to windward. Double reefed and clawing west. She'd never see us in a thousand years, and if she did she couldn't do us any good. Forget her!"

The schooner inched her way imperceptibly under the horizon. The boys had eaten nothing for twenty-four hours; excitement had prevented them from feeling hungry. Now they came to a realization that they had stomachs, and they finished half the hard bread remaining in the bag.

"We'll save the rest," decided Jim. "May need it worse later than we do now."

Percy could easily have eaten twice his share, but he recognized the wisdom of Jim's decision. Both were very thirsty, but without a drop of fresh water aboard there was nothing to do but wait.

At four o'clock came disaster. The drug suddenly let go!

Round whirled the dory, side to the seas. Jim grabbed the oar and jammed it into the scull-hole, but before he could wet the blade a crumbling roller almost swamped the boat. Out went everything that would float.

"Save that bucket, Perce!" shouted Spurring.

Percy clutched the handle just as the pail was going over the side. He bailed, while Spurling brought the flooded craft stern to the seas.

"Take her now, Perce! Give me the bucket!"

Furiously he began scooping out the water. After a long, discouraging fight the boat was bailed clear.

"We've got to run before it while I rig another drug," said Spurling. "Keep her as she is."

In the stern stood a five-gallon can of gasolene, one of the few things that had not been washed overboard when the dory filled. Making use of the sadly diminished coil of ground-line, Jim fastened this can to the end of the painter. Picking a smooth chance, he swung the bow up into the wind again; and soon they were floating snugly behind their new drug.

For another hour they drifted uneventfully. Out of a cloudless sky the red sun dropped below the flying spindrift. A second night was coming, and still the norther raged with undiminished violence.

It was growing dark and the stars were already out when a new sound fell on Percy's ears.

"What's that?" he exclaimed.

Up from the south came a faint, long-drawn, mournful voice, _Oo-oo-oo-ooh!_ They listened breathlessly. It sounded again, _Oo-oo-oo-ooh!_

"Whistling buoy!" ejaculated Jim. He thought a moment. "Cashe's Ledge!" he shouted. "Sixty miles south of Tarpaulin! That's drifting some since yesterday afternoon. Must be less than a mile to leeward or we couldn't hear it against this gale."

Nearer and nearer, louder and louder, sounded the melancholy note, just west of south. Both boys strained their eyes.

"I see it!" cried Percy, triumphantly. "There--rising on that swell! Almost astern! It's striped red and black!"

But Jim gave him no heed. Lips parted and face pale, he was gazing intently at something farther off. Suddenly he lifted his hand.

"Listen! Do you hear that?"

Above the noise of the surrounding sea rose a low, savage roar. Percy caught Jim's alarm.

"What is it?"

"The breaker on the shoal! Sometimes it combs up high as a house. It's less than a quarter-mile southwest of the buoy, and we're drifting straight down upon it! If we go over it, we'll be swamped, sure as fate, drug or no drug! We'll simply be buried under tons and tons of water!"

Percy fought off his panic.

"What shall we do?" he stammered.

"Make the whistler--if we can. It's buoy or breaker, and mighty quick, too!"

The dory's drift, if unchanged, would take her several yards west of the steel can crowned with its red whistle-cage. Its warning blast set the air vibrating, _Oo-oo-oo-ooh!_

Jim snatched out his knife and sprang forward.

"Oar in the scull-hole, Perce! Lively!"

Driving the point of his blade into the side of the bow, he dragged the painter in until he reached the gasolene-can. Severing the rope with one quick, strong slash, he scrambled aft and seized the oar.

"Stand by with that painter to jump for the buoy, when I put the bow against it! Better take off your shoes first!"

Percy obeyed. In his stocking feet he would be less liable to slip on the wet iron. Making a loose coil of the painter, he crouched in the bow. Meanwhile Jim had turned the dory round and headed her north of the whistler. A strong current was setting toward the shoal. It took all his strength to scull against it.

Rapidly they neared the can. About eight feet in diameter at the water-line, it tapered to two feet across its flat top, seven feet above. From the circumference rose two iron bails, crossing each other at right angles, several inches above the whistle, which stood two and one-half feet high. A little to one side stuck up the small tube of the intake valve. Round the buoy above the water-line were bolted four lugs, or iron handles, by which the can could be hoisted on board the lighthouse steamer.

As the steel cone sank the whistle bellowed resonantly. Down, down, till the waves swept over its top. Then, slowly it began to rise. The bellowing cut off, and the air rushed into the intake tube.

Percy watched it, fascinated. Jim's voice roused him to their peril.

"Look sharp! Be ready!"

Less than ten feet of wild black water lay between the madly leaping bow and the buoy. Beyond it the shoal broke with an angry roar in a long line of crumbling foam. Percy gathered his strength for the leap.

The distance lessened, foot by foot. Foot by foot the red-and-black cone emerged, as if thrust up by a giant hand. Percy fastened his eyes on a lug.

A grayback heaved the dory forward.

"Now!" screamed Jim.

Young Whittington sprang upon the bow thwart, painter end in his right hand, and leaped for the lug. A second later the boat crashed against the buoy.

His left hand caught the bent iron bar; his right missed it. His body thudded against the riveted side, slid down, and he hung by one arm, waist-deep in the water.

OO-OO-OO-OOH!!!

From the inverted mouth of the whistle, a few feet above, a hoarse, deafening blast roared down into his face.

As he flung up his right hand and passed the end of the painter through the lug a body shot over his head. Spurling had leaped on the top of the dropping buoy. Percy was dragged down under the surface, the whistle still ringing in his ears. He clung desperately to lug and painter.

The vibrations ceased. The can had reached its lowest point. It was rising again. Out came his head.

"Can you hold on a minute, Perce?" roared Spurling's voice.

"Yes," strangled Percy.

"Then let go that painter! I've got it."

Hanging head down, his legs twined round a bail, Spurling worked rapidly with both hands. Soon he had fastened the rope securely to the lug, mooring the dory to the buoy.

OO-OO-OO-OOH!

The can was sinking again. Putting both hands under Percy's arms, Jim lifted him. Then he lowered his grip to the boy's waist. That terrific blast rendered speech inaudible, but Percy understood. As the water raised part of his weight, he scrambled up over his friend's body.

Thirty seconds later, drenched and gasping, they stood clinging to the bails on the top of the buoy.

XIX

ON THE WHISTLER

Jim was the first to recover his breath.

"Well!" he ejaculated. "Here we are! And mighty fortunate! We'll neither of us ever have a closer shave."

He looked southwest, where the ledge was breaking white through the gloom, and shook his head. Percy, shivering with excitement, said nothing; but he felt as thankful as his mate. They stood close together on the circular top, holding on to the crossed bails, waist-high. Between them rose the whistle, thirty inches tall. Every time they sank in the trough it emitted its dismal bellow.

To leeward the dory wallowed at the end of her painter, almost full of water.

"Split her bow when we struck," said Spurling. "Just as well not to be in her. At any rate, we're not drifting."

Their position, however, was none too secure. The buoy had a rise and fall of seven feet. Unsteadied by keel or rudder, it bobbed unexpectedly this way and that. The boys were obliged to cling fast to keep their footing on the narrow, slippery top.

A sudden jump of the rolling can wrenched Percy's right hand from its hold. But for his left, he would have been flung into the sea.

"That won't do," said Spurling.

Producing a coil of line, he took three or four turns round Percy's waist, and lashed him fast to the bails. He did the same for himself.

"Guess we'll stick on now," he remarked.

"Where did you get that rope?" asked Percy.

"It's all that's left of the ground-line. Thought it might come in handy, so I jammed it inside my oil-coat before I jumped. Never can tell when you'll need a few feet for something or other."

The screech of the buoy, recurring regularly, set their ears ringing.

"We've got to choke that off!" exclaimed Spurling, finally. "We'll go crazy, sure, if we have to listen to it all night."

"How'll you do it? Jam something into the mouth of the whistle?"

"Might smother it that way, but I know an easier one."

He pushed his handkerchief into the curved end of the intake tube just as the bellowing buoy reached its lowest point. The next time it sank there was no sound.

"Can't sing out unless it fills up with air," remarked Spurling. "It's human, so far!"

"Is it all right to shut the signal off altogether? Mightn't some vessel strike the shoal if she doesn't hear it?"

"Not much chance of that to-night! Everything'll give Cashe's a wide berth in a norther. But I'll let it scream a few times every ten minutes. That'll be often enough to warn off any craft within hearing."

The last red embers of the sunset died out, and from horizon to horizon the sky was ablaze with stars. Even the boys, wet, hungry, and exhausted, could not be blind to such magnificence.

"Good evening to study astronomy, Perce!"

"Never saw a finer! But I'd want a steadier foundation than this for my telescope."

As on the previous night, the sea was aglow with phosphorescence. Every wave was crested with silver. Buoy and tugging dory kept the water alive with light as they rose and fell. Leeward the long shoal broke in glittering foam.

Spurling gazed silently down into the eddying tide.

"Runs fast, doesn't it?" said Percy.

"Yes; it's the ebb out of Fundy. Comes piling down over Cashe's at a two-knot rate. When the flood begins it'll run just as hard the other way. That's what makes the shoal so dangerous. There's only from four to seven fathoms over the ledge at low water, and that's little enough in a storm."

"Were you ever down here before?"

"No; but I've heard Uncle Tom Sprowl tell about the place dozens of times. Once, in particular, he was here in a schooner, hand-lining. It was almost calm, just a light east wind blowing, when they anchored an eighth of a mile to weather of the shoal. Pretty soon the decks were alive with fish. It kept breezing on all the time, and the ledge broke higher and higher; but they were having such good luck they hated to leave. So they hung to it till it got too rough for a small boat, and the breaker was twenty or thirty feet high. There was a big cod or haddock on every line, when all of a sudden the cable parted and they began to blow down on the ledge. It took some lively work to save the schooner and themselves. They got sail on her just in time to skin by the end of the breaker. Uncle Tom's been out in some pretty bad storms, but he's always said the time he parted his cable on Cashe's was the closest shave he ever had. See that shark!"

Ten yards off, just under the surface, appeared the glittering outlines of a great fish. It moved leisurely, its projecting fin making a silver ripple.

"Twelve feet, if he's an inch! I'd hate to fall overboard while he's around."

"Think he's a man-eater?"

"Don't know! But I'd rather let somebody else find out. There's another! I've heard fishermen say the sea round here's alive with 'em. I haven't a doubt but those two fellows that chased us to-day are somewhere about. Once they get after a boat, they'll follow it till the cows come home. Guess I'll let Ole Bull give us a few notes!"

He pulled his handkerchief out of the intake tube. Presently the voice of the whistle was echoing across the sea. After a half-dozen screeches Spurling stopped up the tube again.

"That'll do for now! We'll give him another chance in ten minutes."

Up and down went the buoy, pitching and reeling dizzily. An occasional wave-crest buried the boys to the waist.

"No place for a man with a weak stomach, hey, Perce," said Spurling. "You couldn't have stood this two months ago."

Percy was gazing intently southward.

"What's that white spot?" he asked, suddenly, pointing to a glittering patch fifty or sixty yards square.

"School of herring! Now look out for some fun! Something's liable to be after 'em any minute."

Hardly had the words left Jim's mouth when a great white streak moved rapidly toward the schooling fish.

"Whale!" shouted Spurling, excitedly. "Watch out!"

With a tremendous rush the huge, gleaming body shot suddenly clear of the water. For an instant it hung suspended, ten feet above the surface. Then, with a mighty splash, it dropped back, right amid the herring. The glittering school dispersed in a thousand directions, and the monster moved slowly off to the south.

"Biggest whale I ever saw," observed Jim. "Fully seventy feet long! Well, he's had one good meal. Wish we could say the same! Hungry, old man?"

"Yes; but more thirsty."

"Stick to it! Somebody's likely to show up at any time to-morrow and take us off."

"But if they don't--"

"We'll have to hang on till they do."

Percy could hardly stand upright. His joints ached. His eyelids sagged heavily for want of sleep. He would have given anything if he could have lain down. But that was impossible. Something of his father's doggedness enabled him to set his teeth and stand clinging to the bails.

Their plight was bad enough, but it might have been much worse. Percy shivered a bit as he looked at the wallowing dory and the breaker beyond it.

The buoy could not drift. It could not founder. It afforded them a safe refuge from wind and sea; but it could not give them food or drink.

Particularly drink. Every atom in Percy's body, every corpuscle in his blood, seemed to be crying out for water. It did not seem as if he could endure it. He was almost desperate enough to quench his thirst from the sea. But, no! Men who did that went crazy. He moistened his dry lips with his tongue. If only he could have had a full dipper from the spring behind the camp! And he had turned up his nose because it was brackish!

"Wish I had some of Filippo's hot biscuits!" said Jim. "I can taste 'em now."

"Don't, Jim! It makes me feel worse. How long can a man stand it without eating and drinking?"

"There was a fisherman out of Bass Harbor, last October, who went in a power-boat to Clay Bank after hake. His engine played out and he got blown off by a northwester. For over five days he didn't have a thing to eat or drink. Then he got back to Mount Desert Rock. That's the longest I ever heard of."

Five days! And they had not yet gone two. Percy became silent again.

The night dragged painfully. With mortal slowness the Great Bear circled the Pole Star. Jim was acquainted with the principal constellations, and he ran them over for Percy's benefit. Gradually, however, their conversation lagged. You cannot feel much interest in astronomy when your eyes feel as if they were being pressed down by leaden weights and your stomach is absolutely empty.

Percy's body drooped over the bails. Though the position was horribly uncomfortable, he had all he could do to prevent himself from going to sleep, even despite the occasional screeches of the whistle. With an immense effort he stiffened himself upright. Jim was gazing down into the water.

"It's going to moderate before long," he remarked, casually.

Percy came wide awake in an instant.

"How can you tell? It's blowing as hard as ever."

"I know that. But the tide doesn't run so strong against the buoy. Just as it always makes up before the wind comes, so it begins to go down before the wind lessens. I believe the gale'll blow itself out by the middle of the forenoon."

The news seemed too good to be true; but it dispelled Percy's drowsiness. He pried his eyes open and stared around.

The waves were still running high and breaking in fiery sparkles. The silver sharks unwearyingly kept their silent vigil about the rocking buoy. Up the eastern horizon was stealing a faint pallor, harbinger of the approaching dawn.

Lighter and lighter it grew. The gulls, which had been floating on the water all night, began to take wing and fill the air with their grating cries. The phosphorescence died out of the sea. Another day had begun.

Raising his right hand, Spurling turned its open palm toward the north.

"What did I tell you?" he exclaimed. "The wind is going down."

Even Percy could see that it was not blowing so hard. The water, too, had grown much smoother, and the roar of the breaker was not so loud.

"It'll be calm as a mill-pond in a few hours," remarked Jim. "By noon there ought to be some fishermen out here. They always start from Portland on the end of a norther, and run for this buoy to make their grounds from. All we've got to do now is to hold on and wait."

He pulled in the dory and looked her carefully over.

"Bow split open, as I thought," said he. "But apart from that she isn't damaged any. A little work'll make her as good as new. And in the stern is that box with the piston-rod in it. I'd have hated to lose that, after all this fuss. Things might have turned out a good deal worse, eh, Perce? But the next time I'll know enough to hang up at Seal Island."

Jim's cheerfulness was contagious. Percy felt better. Though he was still tormented by hunger and thirst, the thought that relief might soon come gave him courage to endure them. Jim let the dory slip back to the end of her painter.

"Might as well take an Indian breakfast."

He buckled his belt a hole tighter.

"Not a sail in sight yet! We could lie down in the dory and go to sleep, if she wasn't full of water. But, as things are, we'll have to make ourselves as comfortable as we can right here. Let's hope it won't be for long!"

The gale weakened to a brisk breeze. The sea fell rapidly to a long, lazy swell, on which the buoy rocked drowsily. The warm sun inclined the boys to sleep; but they fought it off and scanned the horizon with eager eyes. Seven o'clock. Eight. Nine. Ten. And still no sign of a sail.

At half past ten a smoke-feather rose in the east.

"Yarmouth boat on her way to Boston," said Jim. "She'll pass too far north to see us."

He was right. The steamer's course kept her on the horizon, several miles off. Before long she vanished to the west. Half past eleven went by, and no fishermen appeared. Percy began to fear that Jim was mistaken, after all.

"Here comes our packet," remarked Spurling, quietly.

A tiny saw-tooth of canvas was rising out of the sea, miles northwest. As it grew larger it developed into a schooner under full sail, heading straight for the buoy.

"She sees us," said Jim.

Percy felt like dancing for joy. Nearer and nearer came the schooner. The boys could see her crew staring curiously at them from along her rail. Fifty yards off she shot up into the wind and prepared to launch a boat. They could read the name on her starboard bow.

"The _Grade King_," spelled Spurling. "I know her. She's a Harpswell vessel. Come out to seine herring. Bet she left Portland early this morning. Her captain's Silas Greenlaw; he used to sail with Uncle Tom. He'll use us O. K."

A dory with two men in it came rowing toward the buoy.

"How long've you fellows been hanging on here?" shouted a red-sweatered, gray-haired man in the stern.

"Since six last night. We blew down from Tarpaulin Island in the norther. Don't you know me, Captain Greenlaw?"

"Why, it's Jim Spurling, Tom Sprowl's nephew!" exclaimed the astonished captain. "So the gale blew you down from Tarpaulin, eh? Well, all I've got to say is that you were confounded lucky to hit the buoy and not the breaker. How long since you've had anything to eat or drink?"

"Forty-six hours since we've had a swallow of water, and about twenty since we finished our last hard bread."

"Well, well! You must be hungry and thirsty! Come right aboard and we'll see what we can do for you."

Gladly the boys cut the lashings that bound them to the bails. The whistle gave a screech of farewell as they tumbled stiffly into the boat. The solid deck of the _Gracie_ felt good beneath their feet.