CHAPTER VI—TOM HAS A BAD QUARTER OF AN HOUR
“So the youngster was going to be high-handed with ye, was he?” demanded the florid-faced one, and despite the intense darkness there in the woods, Tom Halstead could see the ugly gleam in his strong-handed captor’s eyes.
The swarthy one stepped to the other side of his friend and whispered something in that worthy’s ear. It was a rather long communication. Though he tried with all his might to overhear some of it, Halstead could not distinguish a single word. Yet, as the narration proceeded, Tom felt that powerful grip on his coat collar increase in intensity.
“Well, we’ll take care of you, youngster,” declared the florid-faced one at last. “You’re too big a nuisance to have at large! And as you’ve been giving your time to other folks’ business, we’ll take good care of your time after this! Come along now!”
Tom had not tried to resist and for a most excellent reason. He well knew that his present captor could fell him like a log. Here no contest of muscles was to be thought of. Craft must be substituted for strength.
In the boy’s brain revolved swiftly many plans for escape. Just as the florid-faced one started to force him over the path lately taken the right idea came to the young captive. He puckered his lips, emitting a shrill whistle.
Nor had he guessed wrongly. There was an echo here. Back on the air came almost the exact duplicate of the whistle Halstead had let loose.
In a jiffy both of his captors halted. Perhaps they suspected it to be only an echo, but they wanted to make sure.
Quicker than a flash, though, before they could make any tests for themselves, Halstead shouted:
“Fine! Rush ’em quick, fellows! Jump on ’em and hold ’em down. Don’t let either rascal get away!”
His voice was so joyous, so exultant, that it completely fooled the pair for an instant. Though the florid-faced one did not release the tightness of his grip on the young skipper’s coat collar, he, like the swarthy one, used his eyes to look about in all directions.
That moment was enough for Tom Halstead, doubly quick-witted in his peril. His hands flew up the front of his uniform coat, ripping buttons out of button holes at one swift move. Wrench! Tom slipped out of his coat, springing ahead under the trees.
“Here, you! Come back here!” roared the florid-faced one absurdly, as he plunged after the young fugitive. The swarthy one, too, joined in the chase, freeing himself of a torrent of Spanish words.
Tom Halstead had just a few seconds’ start, aided by the darkness that enveloped them all. A hundred yards or so Tom dashed, rather noisily. Then, off at right angles to his former course he sped on tip-toe, nor did he go much more than fifty yards ere he landed up against a straight tree whose low-hanging limbs bore an abundant foliage.
Up this tree-trunk, without hesitation, shinned the young skipper, drawing himself well up among the leaves in what he felt must be record time for such a feat.
For a few moments more he could hear his pursuers stumbling along the wrong course. Then he knew, by the sounds, that they had turned back and were keeping well apart in the hope of covering more ground. But the uncertainty of their steps, however, told the boy up the tree that his pursuers were wholly off the trail and giving up the chase. Then, veering, the florid-faced man and the swarthy one came toward each other. They halted almost squarely under the tree that held young Halstead.
Tom’s first, throbbing thought was that they had tracked him here. He did not stir, but the grim lines around his mouth deepened. Let them try to get him then. They would have to climb the tree to get at him and he meant to make use of his hands and feet in defending himself.
“I can give them all they want for a while,” he told himself between his teeth. In fact, in his excitement he all but made his remark half aloud.
“Well, he’s got away from us, all right,” growled the florid-faced one in a tone of mingled disappointment and rage.
“We shall at least know him well after this,” sighed the swarthy one in a sinister tone.
“And I hope you’ll have your wish,” flared listening Tom indignantly, “though I’ll try to control the time and place of meeting.”
“I’d rather have lost a thousand dollars than that boy,” went on the larger man gruffly.
“A thousand?” sneered the other. “Diablo! I’d give five thousand to have him in our hands this moment.”
“And I believe I’d give more,” echoed Tom silently, “to keep out of your clutches—if I had the money.”
Then, drawing closely together, the pair conversed in whispers. Again Tom groaned over his hearing which, keen as it was, could get nothing connected from the low tones of the pair on the ground. Whatever they were saying, these plotters must be terribly in earnest over something. In his eagerness Tom bent too far forward. His foot slipped. Frantically he clutched at a branch overhead to save himself from plunging to the ground. Of course the move made some noise.
“Diablo! What was that? And so close, too!” demanded the smaller man.
“What?” demanded the larger man.
“That noise! Some one must be prowling about here,” continued the swarthy one in a whisper just loud enough to reach Tom’s ears.
As he spoke the Spaniard’s head turned in such a way as to show that he was looking up into the tree in which Tom stood. It was becoming a truly bad quarter of an hour for the boy.
“I heard nothing,” said the other one gruffly. “Leastways, nothing more than some night animal stirring, maybe.”
“Let’s make a search of these trees,” proposed the Spaniard.
Tom shivered. Danger was again coming much too close to please him.
“Come along,” rejoined the florid-faced one impatiently. “We’re wasting too much time, listening to the whisperings of the wind. Come along, Alvarez.”
After a brief objection the one addressed as Alvarez turned and stepped off with his friend. They had not gone far when Tom Halstead slipped down the tree trunk. Alarmed as he had been when danger threatened most, he now knew that he must follow them.
“For they may lead me straight to Ted Dunstan,” he thought eagerly.
Naturally he did not think it wise to get too close to the pair. Captured again, Tom Halstead knew that he was not likely to be able to be of any further service to his employer. Besides, in escaping and leaving his coat in the hands of the enemy he now remembered how his white shirt might betray him if he got too close to them.
“It’s a wonder they didn’t see all this white when I was up in the tree,” he muttered, as he stole along in pursuit. “The leaves must have covered me mighty well.”
For perhaps five minutes Halstead kept steadily behind the pair, guiding himself by the distant sound of their steps, for they did not keep to any path. Then suddenly the boy halted. The noise of footsteps ahead had died out. Tom stood, silent, expectant, but no sound came to his ears in the next two or three minutes. Then a disagreeable conclusion forced itself on the young skipper’s mind.
“Gracious! They’ve slipped away from me or else they’re at the end of their tramp.”
Again Halstead stole forward on tiptoe. But, though he spent nearly the next half-hour in exploring, he found nothing to reward his search. He came at last to a road which he judged to be the same one along which he had started with the Spaniard. Taking his course from the stars, seaman fashion, Halstead kept along. Within ten minutes he was upon a road that looked like a highway.
“Say, but how good that sounds!” he thrilled, suddenly halting. He had the presence of mind next to slip behind the trunk of a big tree.
A horse was moving lazily along the road. There was the sound of wheels, too, though above all rose a cheery whistling, as though the owner of that pair of lips were the happiest mortal alive. It was a good, contented whistling. It had about it, too, the ring of honesty. The cheery sound made Tom Halstead feel faith at once in the owner of that whistle.
Then there came into sight a plain, much-worn open buggy, drawn by a sleek-looking gray horse. Seated in the vehicle was a youngster of about Tom’s own age, who looked much like a farmer’s boy. He had no coat on, his suspenders being much in evidence. On his head he wore a nondescript, broad-brimmed straw hat of the kind used by haymakers. At least it looked as though it might once have been that sort of a hat, but its shape was gone. From where Halstead stood not much of a glimpse could be had of the boy’s face.
“Good evening, friend,” Tom hailed, stepping out from behind the tree.
“Evening! Who-o-oa!” The other boy reined up, peering down through the semidarkness. “Want a lift?”
“Just what, if it happens that you’re headed toward the town of Nantucket,” Tom replied.
“That’s just where I’m headed. But hold on—gracious! I came within an ace of forgetting. I’ve got to turn back and drive to Sanderson’s for a basket of eggs. Won’t take me long, though. Pile in.”
Tom gladly accepted the invitation. After his late experiences it seemed good to be again with some one who appeared to be wholesome and friendly. The other boy turned about, laying the whip lightly over the horse.
“Look as if you were off of some yacht,” commented the other boy, noting Halstead’s blue trousers and cap.
“I’m the skipper at present on Mr. Dunstan’s ‘Meteor,’” Tom explained.
“Say, that’s the man whose son disappeared to-day,” exclaimed the other boy.
“Then you’ve heard about it?”
“Yep; it’s all over the island now, I guess. Constables been going everywhere and asking a heap of questions. Have they found young Ted?”
“I’m afraid not,” sighed Tom.
“Too bad. But who could have wanted him to disappear?”
“That’s a long story,” Tom answered discreetly. “But say, where are you going?”
For the young driver was turning off the road to go to the very farmhouse to which the pier seemed to belong.
“To Sanderson’s, as I told you,” replied the other boy.
“Does that pier down at the water front belong to him?”
“Yep, though I guess he don’t have much use for it.”
“What sort of man is Sanderson?”
“Good enough sort, I guess.”
“What does he do for a living?”
“He farms some, but I guess that don’t amount to a lot,” replied the young driver. “I hear he’s going into some new kind of business this fall. Some kind of a factory he’s going to build on the place. I know he’s been having a lot of cases of machinery come over on the boat from Wood’s Hole lately.”
“Machinery?” echoed Halstead. Somehow, from the first, that word struck a strange note within him.
“There’s Sanderson, now,” continued the young driver, pointing toward the house with his whip.
Then the buggy drew up alongside the back porch. Halstead had plenty of chance to study this farmer as he greeted the young driver:
“Hullo, Jed Prentiss. After them eggs?”
“Yes; and nearly forgot ’em.”
“I reckoned you’d be along about now. Well, I’ll get ’em.”
Farmer Sanderson appeared to be about fifty years of age. He would have been rather tall if so much of his lanky height had not been turned over in a decided stoop of the shoulders. He had a rough, weather-beaten skin that seemed to match his rough jean overalls and flannel shirt. The most noticeable thing about this man was the keenness of his eyes. As the farmer came out again to put the basket of eggs in the back of the buggy Tom Halstead asked suddenly:
“Do you know a man who looks like a Spaniard and wears brown striped trousers and a black coat?”
Farmer Sanderson, so the young captain thought, gave a slight start. Then he unconcernedly placed the basket in the buggy before he answered:
“Can’t say as I know such a party. But I’ve seen a fellow that answered that description.”
“When, if I may ask, and where?”
“Why, late this afternoon I saw such a party hanging around my pier. I s’posed he was fishing, but I didn’t go down to ask any questions.”
Tom put a few more queries, though without betraying too deep an interest. Farmer Sanderson answered with an appearance of utter frankness, but Tom learned nothing from the replies.
“I wonder,” ventured Jed Prentiss, after they had driven some distance along the road, “whether you think your Spanish-looking party had anything to do with Ted Dunstan’s being missing?”
Tom laughed good-naturedly, but made no reply, thinking that the easiest way of turning off the question.
“Say,” broke in Jed again after a while, “I wish you could get me a job aboard the ‘Meteor.’”
“What kind of a job?” inquired the young captain.
“Why, I’m generally handy aboard a boat. Been out on fishing craft a good deal. The job I struck Mr. Dunstan for, some weeks ago, was that of steward. You see, I’m a pretty fair sea cook, too. But Mr. Dunstan said he didn’t need a steward or a cook aboard. I wonder if he’d change his mind.”
“He might,” replied Tom.
“Do you think you’d like to have me aboard?”
“From what I’ve seen of you, Jed, I think I would,” replied Tom Halstead heartily. “At any rate, I’ll speak to Mr. Dunstan about you.”
“Will you, though?” cried Jed delightedly. “Say, I’d give my head—no, but the hair off the top of my head—to go cruising about on the ‘Meteor.’ It must be a king’s life.”
“It is,” Tom assented.
Then, for some time, the two boys were silent But at last Tom Halstead, after some intense thinking, burst out almost explosively:
“Machinery? Great Scott!”
“Er—eh?” queried Jed, looking at him in surprise.
“Oh, nothing,” returned the young skipper evasively. “Just forget that you heard me say anything, will you?”
“Sure,” nodded Jed obligingly. Soon after, they drove into the quaint little old seaport, summer-resort town, Nantucket. Tom’s glance alighted on a bicycle shop, still open. Thanking Jed heartily for the lift, Halstead hurried into the shop. He succeeded in renting a bicycle, agreeing that it should be returned in the morning. Then, after some inquiries as to the road, Tom set out, pedaling swiftly.
He got off the road once, but in the end found the Dunstan place all right. At the gateway to the grounds Halstead dismounted. For a few moments he stood looking up at the house, only a part of which was lighted.
“Machinery?” repeated the young skipper to himself, for the twentieth time. “Machinery? Eh? Oh, but we want to know all about that, and, what’s more, we’ve got to know. Machinery! It pieces in with some other facts that have come out to-day.”
Then mindful of the fact that the news he bore was, or should be, of great importance to the distracted master of the house beyond, Tom Halstead, instead of remounting, pushed his wheel along as he walked briskly up the driveway.
“Machinery!” he muttered once more under his breath. He could not rid himself of the magic of that word.
Yet it was a huge pity that the young motor boat captain could not have possessed sharp enough vision to see into the heart of a dense clump of lilac bushes that bordered the driveway. Had his vision been that keen he would have seen his very Spaniard crouched low in the clump.
That worthy saw the boy and watched him with baleful, gleaming eyes. It was a look that boded no good to the young skipper.
“You are too wise, young gringo, and, besides, you have struck me down,” growled Alvarez. “But we shall take care of you. You shall do no more harm!”