Jed was busy, now, putting out the heaviest fenders along the port side of the hull. Even in the cove the waves were running at a troublesome height. Yet Tom and Joe, by good team work at their respective posts, ran the “Meteor” in alongside the pier, almost without a jar.
“I’m thankful you’re all back safe,” called Mr. Dunstan, coming toward them. “I would have been worried, Mrs. Lester, if I hadn’t known all about the captain and crew that had the boat out.”
But when he heard about the hairbreadth escape from going on the reef off Muskeget Mr. Dunstan’s face went deathly pale. He asked the ladies to return to the house, while he boarded the “Meteor” and faced the boys anxiously.
“What on earth can it mean that the gasoline ran out?” he demanded. “Dawson, are you absolutely sure that you had plenty of oil when you returned at daylight this morning?”
“Positive of it, sir,” came emphatically from Engineer Joe.
“Then that oil must have been pumped quietly out of the tank while you three slept almost the sleep of the dead,” exclaimed the owner.
“It was pumped out very early in the day, too,” Tom insisted. “Such a big quantity couldn’t have been pumped anywhere except overboard. It would have taken several barrels to hold what was in the tank. Yet, by the time we were on deck, at a little after noon, there wasn’t a sign of gasoline anywhere on the water about us. The tide had carried it away.”
“I suppose anyone could have operated a steam-engine over your heads and you boys wouldn’t have heard it this morning, you were so sound asleep,” mused Mr. Dunstan. “Yet it was in broad daylight that you berthed the boat. It must have been a daring man who would have come down openly through these grounds on such an errand.”
“Unless——” began Halstead thoughtfully.
“Well, unless—what, captain?”