“Something’s wrong!” the steersman exclaimed. “There is the South light now! We have been standing in! We are almost on the rocks! Some one changed the lights!”
There were frantic signals to the engine room. The pilot spun the steam steering gear around so fast he almost broke the rudder chains. Slowly the great steamer changed her course and stood out to sea.
Yet so near had she been to the rocks and sand bars that five minutes more and she would have been lost. The passengers asleep in their staterooms never knew how close they were to death.
Back in the lighthouse there were anxious hearts, hearts that beat high lest soon might be heard the booming guns of a ship in distress, or soon might be seen the flaring rockets that told a steamer had gone on the rocks.
Suddenly from below, at the foot of the tower, above the roar of the storm, a voice called:
“What’s wrong here? Where are you, Hardack? What’s the matter with the light?”
“It’s Salt Water Sam!” shouted Jerry. “Help Sam! Come up and bring ropes with you!”
There was the welcome sound of feet ascending the stone stairway. Into the room came the old sailor and Captain Jenkinson. They took in the situation at a glance. In a few minutes the two scoundrels had been securely tied.
“Is the light all right?” was Sam’s first question, for he knew what that meant on such a night.