“O, you can find the place without me. It’s just on the other side of that corn-field. The farmer is there now. I told him that I would send you down.”
The deserters who were lounging about the deck waited to hear no more, but, springing ashore, started at the top of their speed for the farmer’s melon-patch. Rich descended to the deck with all possible speed, the boys clambered up out of the hold, and some of them even jumped upon the wharf and followed the others a short distance; but as soon as the main body of the crew had disappeared behind the house, they hastily returned to the vessel, where Tom and two of his friends were already engaged in hoisting the sails. Rich cast off the line with which the Swallow was made fast, and just as he sprang on board, the sloop moved slowly away from the wharf. Tom’s plan had worked to perfection. Johnny Harding and every one of his friends were on shore, and the seven mutineers had the vessel to themselves.
Rich took the wheel, and, as soon as the sloop had gained steerage-way, he put her about and stood out of the harbor. Of course, it required considerable time to execute all these movements, and scarcely was the Swallow fairly under way, when Johnny and several of his friends appeared, loaded with water-melons. A single glance at the vessel, standing out of the bay, under a full press of canvass, was all that was needed to convince them that they were in a very unpleasant situation. They knew that Rich, Tom, and their friends were about to desert them, and they had no difficulty in divining their motives for so doing. They gathered around their captain for a moment, as if in consultation, and then walked slowly toward the wharf. There was no shouting, no begging to be taken on board, as the mutineers had expected; but they stood looking at the sloop, as if the course her crew might see fit to follow did not interest them in the least.
“Ah ha, Harding!” shouted Rich, as the Swallow dashed by the wharf. “Who’s captain now? I told you that you wouldn’t make any thing by acting mean toward me. You may stay there now until you are captured, or get a chance to go back to Newport.”
“Good-by, fellows,” shouted Miller, waving his hat to the boys on the wharf. “You were afraid to trust Captain Rich, so we thought it best to leave you on shore, where you would be safe.”
None of Johnny’s friends made any reply, for they were well aware that remonstrance would be useless. They knew that Rich always took a fiendish pleasure in revenging an injury, and, knowing that he deemed himself insulted, as well as abused, by being relieved of the command, they did not think it at all probable that he would allow so good an opportunity to punish them for what they had done slip by unimproved. They were not at all surprised at the action he had taken. Their only wonder was, that they had been foolish enough to trust him.
At this moment, the sloop rounded a point at the entrance of the harbor, and a sight met the gaze of her crew that astonished and alarmed them. Coming straight into the bay, at full speed, was one of Mr. Newcombe’s fast tugs, and so close was she to the runaways, that all attempts at escape seemed useless. The Swallow was caught at last. So thought Captain Rich, and so thought the boys on the wharf, who could not refrain from shouting with delight when they discovered that the voyage, which their treacherous companions had expected to enjoy, was likely to be brought to a speedy termination. The forecastle of the tug was crowded with students, and, among them, the deserters saw the lieutenant-colonel. The captain of the tug was at the wheel, and, as soon as he discovered the sloop, he rang the bell to “stop,” and then to “back,” at the same time turning the steamer’s bow toward the Swallow, as if it was his intention to run along-side of her.
“How are you, Newcombe?” exclaimed the colonel, flourishing a paper which was, doubtless, his “warrant” for the apprehension of the deserters. “You, and the rest of your party, may consider yourselves prisoners.”
Rich was desperate. The Swallow’s capture seemed inevitable; and, had all the deserters been on board, it is probable that he would not have thought of escape. But he and his friends had seized the sloop with the intention of having a cruise on their own hook; and he thought how all the boys they had left behind would laugh at them if they failed! They would consider it conclusive evidence that Rich was not fit to be captain. While the latter was wondering what he should do, the tug continued to approach the sloop slowly, and presently a man stepped upon her bow and began to use a lead-line. This suggested an idea to Rich, and he was prompt to act upon it. When he first discovered the tug, he had thrown the sloop up into the wind, but now he filled away again, and, putting the helm down, ran across the steamer’s bows, almost grazing her as the Swallow went by.
“How are you now, Colonel Smith?” shouted Rich, as he shaped the sloop’s course toward the beach, where he knew the tug could not follow her. “We’ll not consider ourselves prisoners just yet, if you please.”