CHAPTER XXX.

THE STOLEN SKIFF.

The sun streamed into the miserable old shanty. It had looked unattractive enough by night. Seen by day it was ten times more shabby and ramshackle. Old fish nets, ragged, frayed lines, all the paraphernalia of a river fisherman lay scattered about.

On the crude table stood some unwashed tin dishes, great shad-flies and eel bugs buzzing about them with a whirring sound. Against the wall hung some of old Whey’s clothes, queer, homemade garments, half patches and half the original material; it was hard to tell where one began and the other ended. The sunlight that streamed into the squalid place, which had an untidy, dirt floor, came from the same window through which Ralph had observed the light the night before.

The place was the typical home of a St. Lawrence River fisherman. In one corner stood the old man’s most cherished possessions, his sturgeon spears and a big jack lantern for night fishing. A crude attempt at taxidermy, too, was above an open fireplace at one end of the hut—a stuffed “butter-ball” duck. It stood wobbling on one leg, the seams of its sewn-up skin bursting through with the cotton that stuffed it.

In the opposite corner was a rusty stove with three legs, the place of a fourth support being supplied by a log. A few tin plates, clumsy knives and forks, bags of flour, potatoes, onions and other staples about completed the furnishings of the hut. The roof was leaky, as some muddy pools on the floor and the sunlight streaming through sundry holes into the room, amply testified.

Ralph’s eye took in all this in a few seconds. Then his mind reverted to his loss. Beyond a doubt, old man Whey was the thief. The old rascal must have decided to search his guest in the night and abstract whatever of value he found. The boy could not help an indignant exclamation as he thought of the almost priceless collection of gems the old man’s rapacious fingers had gathered in.

“Just to think,” exclaimed Ralph indignantly, “that an old, half-senile man should have robbed me of precious stones that I thought nobody could take from me!”

Angry at his lack of caution in not having hidden them before he entered the hut, Ralph went to the door. It was ajar, and a touch threw it open. Outside, the morning sparkled brightly. The hut was on the river’s edge. On the shore was drawn up a St. Lawrence skiff, a narrow, double-ended craft of a type peculiar to the great river.

Its oars lay on their fixed thole pins and the line that lay up on the beach was bone dry. Plainly, if this was the old man’s only boat, which, considering his poverty-stricken state, was likely, old Whey had not been out that morning.

This rather puzzled Ralph. He had made up his mind that the old man had risen as soon as the storm died out—or perhaps he had not gone to bed at all—and had looted his garments and bed and then made off with their valuable contents. If the venerable thief had decamped, however, it was plain he had not gone in his own boat; that is, unless he was possessed of more than one, which, for the reasons mentioned, was highly improbable.

Some bacon was in a frying-pan on the rusty stove in which a fire was smoldering. A pot of coffee, also, stood there; and with some bread from one of the corner cupboards Ralph managed to make a rough breakfast. Then, refreshed and invigorated, he set out for the scene of the wreck. Naturally, the desire to see how badly the _River Swallow_ was damaged was uppermost in his mind. It outweighed even his worry over the losing, or, rather, the theft, of the leather wallet.

He had not proceeded very far when his steps were arrested by a low cry from a clump of brush back from the beach.

“Don’t strike me again! Don’t!” came in a trembling voice from whoever was concealed there.

“Somebody hurt,” said Ralph to himself, and began to hasten up the beach toward the clump of bushes.

As his footsteps crunched on the gravel the voice broke out afresh:

“It’s the boy’s wallet, I tell you. You mustn’t steal it! Give it back! Give it back!”

Much mystified at this mention of the wallet, Ralph parted the bushes. He had hardly done so, when he started back with an exclamation. Old man Whey lay there in a crumpled heap. Apparently he was injured. But Ralph soon discovered that although the old man’s face had been bruised by a brutal blow he was not badly hurt.

“What’s the matter, Mr. Whey?” asked the boy, blaming himself for his suspicions of the old man. “What has happened?”

“Oh, is it you, my boy?” asked the old man, opening his eyes. “Three men came to the hut while you were asleep. I had dozed off and opened my eyes in time to see them taking something from under your pillow.”

“Those men!” cried Ralph, guessing the truth. “Were there _three_ of them?”

“Yes. I saw them take your wallet. I chased them and told them to give it back, but they laughed at me and then struck my face as you see, and threw me into these bushes. I’m not much hurt, but I’m half dead from fright.”

Ralph’s mind was busy reconstructing things. There were three men. That, then, made it plain that La Rue had not perished, but had managed to get ashore through the shallow water. He must have met Malvin and the Norwegian sailor when they landed, which accounted for the prompt disappearance of the latter two.

Apparently, then, they had watched him (Ralph) come ashore, and had tracked him to the hut of old man Whey. Having done this, they had awaited an opportunity to recover the gems, which Hansen had evidently seen Ralph transfer from the coat pocket of La Rue’s discarded garment to his own. It may be said here, that this is precisely what had happened and Ralph’s guesses were not a whit short of the whole truth of the matter.

Despite his anxiety to reach the scene of the wreck, the boy felt that his first duty lay to old man Whey, who was in a pitiable condition of shakiness over his fright. But when Ralph had helped him to his feet, he rallied and began to grow quite angry.

“Ah! If I’d been young and strong like I was once this wouldn’t have happened,” he quavered. “I’d have given them something to think over. Yes, I would. But I’m old and all alone since Jimmie left me.”

“Who was Jimmie?” asked Ralph, more to keep the old man’s mind off his brutal treatment than anything else, as the two advanced toward the hut.

“Jimmie! Why, he was my grandson. He was a fine little lad, Jimmie was, but he was lost in his boat two years ago, and I’ve never got a trace of him since.”

“Lost? You mean that he was lost in a storm?”

“Yes. Jimmie was out fishing when one of those storms we call a twister came up. The last I saw of him he was being blown round that point yonder. I’ve never seen him since. He’d be about twelve years old now, Jimmie would. He was a fine boy,” garrulously went on the old man, “and after his father, my last living son, died, Jimmie meant a lot to me.”

His voice broke and his dim old eyes grew dimmer.

“You don’t think it possible that he may have been saved?” inquired Ralph, with a vague hope of comforting the old man.

Old Whey shook his head mournfully.

“No, sir. Jimmie’s dead and gone, he is, and the old man is left alone. All alone.”

After he had had some strong coffee and breakfast, however, the old man rallied. He said he would accompany Ralph to the scene of the wreck. He suggested taking the row boat, as it would be easier than walking. Just as a westerner catches up a pony rather than walk a quarter of a mile, so a denizen of the St. Lawrence always travels in a skiff or a punt or a “put-put” (St. Lawrence for motor boat), if he is lucky enough to possess one.

But when they came out of the hut, imagine the surprise of the old man and the boy when they saw that the boat had gone!

There was no question about it, the skiff had vanished utterly without leaving a trace.

They hurried to the beach, the old man almost tearful over this new calamity. Ralph bent and examined the ground in the vicinity of the place where the boat had lain. Then he straightened up with an angry exclamation.

“La Rue’s work again!” he cried. “Three men have been here and, beyond the shadow of a doubt, it was La Rue and his companions. They have escaped from the island with the gems in your stolen boat.”