CHAPTER III—THE LUCKIEST BOY IN THE WORLD
Hardly had Mr. Dunstan’s new boat crew followed him ashore when a whooping yell sounded from up the road that led to the house. Then into sight dashed a boy mounted on a pony. On they came at a full gallop, the boy reining up with a jerk when barely six feet from his father.
“Careful, Ted!” warned Mr. Dunstan laughingly. “Don’t ride me down. You’re not yet through with your use for a father, you know.”
“I was trying to show you, dad, how Sheridan and I are learning our paces together,” replied the youngster. He was a rather slightly built boy, with clustering yellow hair and gray eyes. He wore a khaki suit and a sombrero modeled after the Army campaign hat. Even his saddle was of the Army type, being a miniature McClellan in model.
Tom liked this lad after the first look. There was something whole-souled about this little fellow with the laughing eyes. And, though he had been reared in a home of wealth, there was nothing in the least snobbish in the way he suddenly turned to regard the Motor Boat Club boys.
“Ted, Captain Halstead and his friend, Dawson,” said Mr. Dunstan. “You’ll be glad to know that they’ve got the ‘Meteor’ in running order again.”
Ted was careful to dismount before he offered his hand, with graceful friendliness, to each of the boys.
“You’ve made dad happy if you’ve got his boat to running again,” laughed Master Ted.
“And you? Aren’t you fond of motor boating?” queried Tom.
“Oh, yes; after a fashion, I suppose,” replied the Dunstan hopeful deliberately. “But then, you see, I’m cut out for a soldier. I’m to go into the Army, you know, and anything to do with salt water smacks a bit too much of the Navy.”
All of which remarkable declaration Master Ted made as though he imagined these new acquaintances understood all about his future plans.
“The Army is fond of the Navy, of course,” the lad added by way of explanation. “Yet, to a soldier, the Army is the whole thing.”
“Oh, I see,” smiled Captain Tom, though in truth he didn’t “see” in the least.
“Yes, Ted’s to be a soldier. He’s doomed—or destined—to that career,” nodded Mr. Dunstan good-humoredly. “There’s a whole long story to that, Halstead. Perhaps you and Dawson shall hear the story later. But for now we’d better get up to the house.”
Master Ted evidently took this as a hint that the subject was to be pursued no further for the present, for he merely said in a very gracious way:
“Of course, I shall see you again. So now I’ll take myself off—with Sheridan.”
Resting his left hand through the bridle and gripping the pony’s mane, Master Ted used his right hand to strike the pony a smart blow over the rump. As the pony bounded forward the lad made a flying leap into the saddle. It was such a flying start as almost to startle Tom and Joe.
“He rides like a cowboy,” declared Tom admiringly, watching the mounted youngster out of sight.
“He has need to, I fancy,” replied Mr. Dunstan gravely. “That is, since he’s going into the Army, for Ted wouldn’t be satisfied with being anything less than a cavalryman.”
As Mr. Dunstan’s last words or the tone in which they were uttered seemed to dismiss the subject, Halstead and his chum knew that they were not to be further enlightened for the present. They followed their employer up to the house.
He took them into a roomy, old-fashioned looking library, with heavy furniture, and, excusing himself, left them. He soon returned to say:
“The family are now at luncheon, all except Master Ted, so I have given instructions to have luncheon served to us in here presently.”
In half an hour the meal was before Mr. Dunstan and the boys. It tasted rarely good after their hasty snatches of food aboard the boat. When it was over Mr. Dunstan took a chair on the porch, lighted a cigar and said:
“I’m going to take it easy for a while. Would you like to look about the grounds?”
Tom and his chum strolled about. They found it a delightful country place, covering some forty acres. There was a large stable, a carriage house and a garage which contained a big touring car. There were greenhouses, a poultry place and a small power house that supplied electric light to the buildings and grounds.
“It looks like the place of a man who has enough money, but who doesn’t care about making a big splurge,” commented Joe.
“It also looks like the place of an easy-going man,” replied Halstead. “I wonder how a man like Mr. Dunstan came to get the motor-boat craze?”
“Oh, I imagine he likes to live out on this beautiful old island, and merely keeps the boat as a means of reaching business,” suggested Dawson.
After an hour or more they returned to the house to find Mr. Dunstan placidly asleep in the same porch chair. So the boys helped themselves to seats, kept quiet and waited. They were still in doubt as to whether their employer wanted to use the boat later in the day. Theirs was a long wait, but at last Mr. Dunstan awoke, glanced at his watch and looked at the boys.
“Becoming bored?” he smiled.
“Oh, no,” Tom assured him, “but I’ve had hard work to keep from falling sound asleep.”
“Have you seen Master Ted lately?”
“Not since we first met him down by the pier.”
“That’s a youngster with quite a picturesque future ahead of him, I imagine,” continued Mr. Dunstan. “I call him the luckiest boy alive. Perhaps he is not quite that, but he is going to be a very rich man if he follows a certain career.”
“It must be an Army career, then,” hinted Halstead.
“It is, just that. And I suppose I might as well tell you the story, if it would interest you any. A lot of people know the story now, so there’s no harm in repeating it.”
Their host paused to light a cigar before he resumed:
“Ours used to be a good deal of a military family. In fact, every generation supplied two or three good soldiers. There were five Dunstans, all officers, serving in the War of the Revolution. There were four in the War of 1812, two in the War with Mexico and two in the Civil War. We gradually fell off a bit, you see, in the numbers we supplied to the Army. The two who served in the Civil War were uncles of mine. My father didn’t go—wasn’t physically fit. There were three of us brothers, Gregory, Aaron and myself. Both were older than I. Aaron would have made a fine soldier, but he was always weakly. The fact that he couldn’t wear the uniform almost broke his heart. Yet Aaron had one fine talent. He knew how to make money almost without trying. In fact, he died a very rich man.
“Greg, on the other hand, was what I expect you would call the black sheep of the family. He went to Honduras years ago. He’s a planter, doing fairly well there, I suppose. He’s pretty wild, just as he used to be. He’s always getting mixed up in the many revolutions that they have down in that little republic of Honduras. One of these days I’m afraid he’ll be shot by a file of government soldiers for being mixed up in some new revolutionary plot.
“My brother Aaron never married. Greg has two daughters, but no sons. Ted is my only son and Aaron just worshiped the lad as the last of the race. Aaron wanted Ted to become a soldier and keep the family in the Army. The youngster was willing enough, but I didn’t wholly fancy it. However, my brother Aaron died a little while ago and I found he had fixed the matter so that Ted will have to be a soldier.”
“How could your brother do that?” asked Tom.
“Why, you see, under the will, brother Greg is let off with one hundred thousand dollars and I get the same. But there’s a proviso in the will that if, within ninety days from Aaron’s death, Ted appears in probate court with me or other guardian, and there both Ted and myself promise that he shall be reared for the United States Army, then half a million dollars is to be paid over to myself or other guardian, in trust for the boy. The income from that half million is to be used to rear and educate him. But Ted, as a part of his promise, must make every effort to get himself appointed a cadet at West Point.”
“Some other boy might get the cadetship away from him,” suggested Joe Dawson.
“In case Ted simply can’t win a West Point cadetship,” replied Mr. Dunstan, “then, at the age of twenty-one, his promise will oblige him to enlist in the Army as a private soldier and do all in his power to win an officer’s commission from the ranks.”
“Even then, there’s a chance to fail,” hinted Tom.
“If the lad fails absolutely to get a commission in the Army,” responded Mr. Dunstan, “he will lose a lot of money—that’s all. There is another fund, amounting to two and a half million dollars, that is to be kept at interest until the young man is thirty. By that time the money, through compound interest, will be much more than doubled. On Ted’s thirtieth birthday all that huge sum of money is to be turned over to him if he has won, somehow, a commission as an officer of the Army. If he has tried, but failed, then the money is to be devoted to various public purposes.
“But if Ted fails to go into probate court on time, with myself or other guardian, and have the promise made a matter of record, then he loses everything. In that case I get the same hundred thousand dollars as otherwise, but Greg, instead of receiving only a hundred thousand is to get a cool million dollars.”
“Isn’t your brother Gregory likely to contest such a will?” asked Tom thoughtfully.
“The will provides that, if he does contest, he shall lose even his hundred thousand dollars,” Mr. Dunstan replied. “I have had great lawyers go all over the will, but they can’t find a single flaw through which it can be broken. You see, the will is right in line with what lawyers call ‘public policy.’ It’s altogether to the public interest to have the boys of our best old families, as of the best new ones, brought up with the idea that, they’re to give their lives to the service of their country. So the will is bound to stand against any contest, and if Greg or myself tried to break it we’d only cheat ourselves out of goodly sums of money.”
“Then Master Ted, of course,” pursued Tom, “has been or is going before the probate court to have the promise recorded.”
“To-day is Tuesday,” answered Mr. Dunstan. “The ninety days are up next Monday. On that day there will be a short session of probate court and Ted and I are going to be on hand.”
“Is this the first time probate court has been in session since the will was read, sir?” asked Halstead.
“Oh, no,” replied their employer in his most easy-going tone. “But there was no hurry and I wanted to give the lawyers plenty of time to consider the matter. Next Monday, being within the required ninety days, will do as well as any other time.”
“Well, of all the easy-going men!” gasped Tom inwardly. “To think, with such a big fortune at stake, of dilly-dallying until the very last day of all!”
“So, you see, Ted really is a very lucky boy,” finished Mr. Dunstan.
“I should say he is!” breathed Halstead, his face flushing at the thought. He would have been happy over a West Point cadetship without any enormous reward.
“The luckiest boy I ever heard of!” vented Joe, his nerves a-thrill over this story of one of Fortune’s greatest favorites. “No wonder your son, sir, is so eager about being a soldier.”
“Is your brother Gregory in this country now?” asked Tom slowly.
“Not to the best of my knowledge,” almost drawled their employer. “The last I heard of him he was still on his plantation in Honduras, probably hatching more revolutionary plots and giving the government a good excuse for sending its soldiers to shoot him one of these days. But I do know that, for a while, Greg had American lawyers hard at work trying to find some way to smash Aaron’s will. They gave it up, though, and so did Greg, after hearing from me that Master Ted was wild to follow a soldier’s career.”
Both boys were silent for some time. Yet, if they did no talking, their thoughts very nearly ran riot. To them it seemed that Ted Dunstan’s lot in life lay in all the bright places of glory and fortune. How they would have relished such a grand chance!
“By the way,” said Mr. Dunstan, rising slowly and stretching, “I haven’t seen the youngster in hours. I think I’ll locate him and bring him around here.”
He went into the house. Within the next ten minutes two of the men servants left the house, running hurriedly out of sight in different directions. At the end of twenty minutes Mr. Dunstan himself appeared, looking actually worried.
“We can’t seem to find Ted anywhere,” he confessed uneasily. “The young man hasn’t been seen since he stabled his pony at half-past twelve. I thought he would lunch with Mrs. Dunstan; she thought he was lunching with us. We’ve sent all about the grounds, we’ve telephoned the neighbors and the town, and all without avail. The pony is in the stable and the young man seems to have disappeared.”
“Disappeared?” repeated Tom Halstead, springing to his feet, electrified by the news. “Don’t you think it more likely, sir, he’s been helped to disappear?”
“You think he may have been spirited away?” demanded Mr. Dunstan. “But why?”
“Haven’t you yourself told us, sir, that it would be worth some one’s trouble, to the extent of nine hundred thousand dollars, to have the boy vanish?” asked Tom breathlessly.
“You suspect my brother?”
“Pardon me, sir, for forgetting that Gregory Dunstan is your brother,” Tom went on whitening. “Yet that talk about disabling the ‘Meteor’! The man who looked like a Spaniard—but the people of Honduras are of Spanish descent. Why should anyone want to disable the ‘Meteor,’ unless to stop a pursuit by water? You yourself have told us that your brother has a weakness for mixing up in revolutions down in Honduras.”
All this Halstead had shot out jerkily, thinking even faster than he spoke.
“But at this very moment Greg is down in Honduras,” objected Mr. Dunstan.
“Even if he is, wouldn’t friends of his, who may want funds for a new revolution, see how easy it was to get the money through getting Ted out of the way?” asked Tom quickly. “Grant that your brother is wholly innocent of any plot about your son. Wouldn’t supposed friends of his perhaps be willing to spirit the boy away, knowing that if the big money prize went to your brother, Gregory Dunstan could afterwards be persuaded to throw his fortune into some new revolutionary cause?”
“Yes, yes, it’s all possible—horribly possible,” admitted Mr. Dunstan, covering his face with his hands. “And Greg, who is a citizen of Honduras now, has even had aspirations in the way of becoming president of Honduras. Halstead, I will admit that I had even thought of the possibility of some just such attempt as this, and yet in broad daylight I dismissed it all as idle dreaming. And now Ted’s gone—heaven only knows what has become of him!”
“Of course,” put in Joe coolly, “it may turn out that the youngster just went fishing. He may walk in any moment for his supper.”
“But he went without his lunch,” retorted Mr. Dunstan. “That was wholly unlike Ted.”
“The ‘Meteor’ may be disabled now,” broke in Tom. “If she isn’t, won’t it be more than well worth while to get the craft out and go scouting through these waters?”
“Yes, yes!” cried Mr. Dunstan. “Come on, boys.”
As they raced down through the grounds they espied the coachman returning.
“Come along, Michael!” shouted Mr. Dunstan. Then, to the boys he explained:
“If the ‘Meteor’ is fit to go out, Michael can go along with you. If there’s any fighting he’s a heavy-fisted, bull-necked fellow who’d face a regiment of thieves.”
Joe had the key of the engine-room hatchway out in his hand before they reached the pier. In a jiffy he had the sliding door unlocked, almost leaping down into the engine room. With swift hands he set the engine in motion.
“All right here,” he reported, while Bouncer, just liberated, frisked about his master’s legs and then whined.
“Keep the bulldog aboard, too, Michael,” called Mr. Dunstan, as he stepped ashore. “Start at once, Captain Halstead. Go as far and wide as you can and hail any craft you think may have news. Michael, I rely upon you to use your fists if there’s need.”
“If there’s the chanst!” grinned the Irishman readily.
“I’ll run back to the house and get in touch with the police,” Mr. Dunstan shouted back over his shoulder.
Tom sprinted aft along the pier, throwing the stern-line aboard. He leaped aboard forward with the bowline, not stopping then to coil it.
Not even calling to Joe, whose head was barely six feet away, young Captain Tom Halstead gave the bridge bellpull a single jerk. As the response sounded in the engine room alert Joe gave the engine slow speed ahead. Tom threw the wheel over and the fine boat glided out from her berth.
Two bells! Full speed ahead! The “Meteor” forged forward, gaining headway every moment. The hunt for missing Ted Dunstan was started in earnest.