Chapter 27

A FIGHTING CHANCE

"Only one week more now before we have to go back to Rally Hall," sighed Teddy one morning, just after they had risen from the breakfast table.

"And nothing done yet in the way of finding that chest of gold," groaned Fred.

"It's now or never," declared Lester with decision.

"I'm afraid it's never, then," put in Bill, the skeptical. "Here for days we've been blistering our hands and breaking our backs, to say nothing of racking what brains we have, and we're no nearer finding it than we were at the beginning."

"I wouldn't go so far as to say that," protested Fred. "We've at least explored a lot of places where there were no signs of the peculiar trees and rock shown in that map that Ross told us about. That leaves just so many fewer places to waste our time on, and makes it more likely that the next will be the right one."

"Not much nourishment in that," persisted Bill. "I'll admit that we've found plenty of places where the gold _isn't_, but that doesn't get us anywhere. And we'll be gray-headed before we can explore the whole coast of Maine."

"Oh, stop your grouching, you old sinner," exhorted Teddy, clapping him on the back. "This is like football or baseball. The game isn't over till after the last minute of play."

"That's the talk," cried Lester emphatically. "If we go down, we'll do it with the guns shotted and the band playing and the flag flying."

It was not to be wondered at that the lads were all assailed at times by the doubt and discouragement that troubled Bill acutely that morning. They had taken advantage of every day when the sea permitted, and, as Teddy phrased it, had "raked the coast fore and aft." Their main reliance had been the map that had appeared in the story of the old sailor to Ross, and the first thing they did after entering any bay or cove was to look about them for the clump of two and three trees, with the big rock standing at the right. Once or twice they had found conditions that nearly answered this description, and they had dug and hunted near by, wherever the lay of the land held out any hope of success.

In the absence of anything better, this supposed map was their strongest clue. Yet even this was only supposition. It might not have been anything more than the fanciful sketch of an idle sailor. Or if it indeed were a map of any given locality, it might not refer in the slightest degree to the robbery by the crew of the smuggler.

The knowledge that this might be so had at times a paralyzing effect on the boys. They felt the lack of solid ground beneath their feet. Like the coffin of Mahomet, they were as though suspended between earth and sky.

Still, it was the only clue they had, and there was something in the make-up of these sturdy young Americans that made them desperately unwilling to confess defeat. It was the "die-in-the-last-ditch" spirit that has made America great. Even Bill, although he relieved himself sometimes by grumbling, would not really have given up the search and when the pinch came he dug and hunted as eagerly as the rest.

This morning, they had arranged to set off for a final cruise that might take up all the remaining time of their vacation, which was now drawing rapidly to a close. Their party was complete, with the exception of Ross. He had gone up to Oakland to spend a few days with his mother, who had arrived from Canada, but he had arranged to meet the boys that day at a point agreed on, about fifteen miles up the coast.

As their cruise was expected to be longer than usual, it took them some time before they had everything on board the _Ariel_ and were ready to cast off from the little pier below the lighthouse.

"Well," said Mr. Lee, who had come down to see them off, "good-by, boys, and luck go with you."

"Watch us come back with that chest of gold," called out Teddy gaily.

"I'll be watching, all right," grinned the lighthouse keeper, "and I have a sort of hunch that you boys will get there this time. You certainly have earned it, if you do lay your hands on it."

"And that's no merry jest, either," remarked Bill, as he looked at the callous spots on his hands.

"Bill wasn't made to work," scoffed Teddy. "He's made to sit on the box and crack the whip, while we common trash pull and strain in the shafts."

"Not much," retorted Bill. "I'm no mule driver."

"It's a touching picture, that of Teddy pulling and straining, isn't it?" laughed Lester, as he pointed to that young gentleman slumped down comfortably in the stern.

With jest and banter, the morning wore away. The day was serene and beautiful, with not a cloud obscuring the sky, while there was just enough wind to make their progress steady and rapid. Almost before they knew it, they had reached the point agreed upon with Ross, and soon after descried the _Sleuth_ coming down to meet them.

They hailed Ross cordially, and his beaming face showed how deep and warm was his feeling for the boys, whom he already seemed to have known for years rather than weeks.

"Some smart navigators, we are, to meet just where we arranged to!" laughed Lester.

"We're the real thing in the way of sailor men," assented Ross, throwing out his chest.

"Listen to the mutual admiration society," jibed the irrepressible Teddy. "Blushing violets aren't in it with them. Here you let my modest worth pass unnoticed, while you're handing bouquets to each other. But that's the way it is in this world. It's nerve and gall that counts. Now if I----"

But his eloquent peroration was spoiled by a hasty shift to escape a life preserver that Lester hurled at his head, missing him by an inch.

"You'd better let me have Teddy aboard the _Sleuth_," laughed Ross. "Then if the engine gives out, I'll start Teddy wagging his tongue. That will furnish power enough."

"Not a bit of it," replied Lester. "I want him here, in case the wind gives out."

"It's evident that I'm the most important person here, anyway," retorted Teddy. "Neither one of you seems to be willing to get along without me."

"Seven cities claimed Homer, you know," said Bill sarcastically.

"Yes," said Teddy complacently, "he and I are in the same class."

Ross turned his boat around, and the two craft went along side by side.

"The sea's like a mill pond to-day," remarked Fred. "How different from the day of the storm, when we watched it from the observation room. Do you remember what your father said?"

"Not especially," answered Lester. "What particular thing do you mean?"

"Why, when he prophesied that many a good ship would lay her bones on a reef or beach before the storm was over."

"I suppose he was anxious," answered Lester gravely, "but I haven't heard of any ship's being wrecked on this particular strip of the coast during this storm. The worst time we've had around here, as far as I can remember, was about three years ago. That storm kept up for three days and three nights, and when it was over there were at least a dozen wrecks, just on the coast of Maine.

"By the way," he went on, as a sudden thought struck him, "we'll have to pass one of those wrecks a few miles from here. It's a schooner that went ashore in the storm. There's part of the hull left, and, if you like, we'll run in and look it over."

"Was the crew saved?" asked Fred.

"Every soul aboard was drowned," Lester answered soberly. "They were swept overboard before the life-saving crew could get to them. The masts went over the side, and the hull was driven so hard and deep into the sand that it has been there ever since."

A half hour more passed, and then Lester gave a twist to the tiller and turned the _Ariel_ inshore.

"There's the wreck," he said in response to Fred's look of inquiry, as he pointed to a dark object near the beach. "We'll just run in and look her over. But we won't be able to stay more than a few minutes, for this is to be one of our busy days."