“I’m going after that cargo again,” repeated Frank, “and I’m going to get it—if those Englishmen haven’t carried it off. Friends of mine, you call ’em! Well, I guess not!”
“How many will it take to carry the cargo out to the boat,” asked Case, giving Jule a sly dig in the ribs, “if we get it away from your friends?”
Frank laughed at the attempt to provoke him, but made no reply, and in a moment Jule resumed his work with the sulphur matches. This playing “spook” with matches was an old trick of the boy’s, and he had brought these old-fashioned ones along on the chance of finding them useful. He was more than satisfied with the result of his first tryout with them, and chuckled as he thought of the fright of Ugly, and also of the assistance he had been able by their aid to render his friends.
Only for his childish prank, he reflected, Case and Frank would still be in the custody of the Indian, and Clay and Alex would be facing the renegades alone.
“What are you going to do when you get through that monkey work?” asked Case, presently, as Jule continued to roll matches in his hands.
“I’m going on board the Rambler,” was the reply.
“I’m going to let Captain Joe out, and tell him what to do to the men in the bush.”
Case glanced again at the lighted prow of the boat and at the wide space one attempting to reach the deck would have to cross under rifle fire.
“You never can do it!” he declared.
“See that tree back there, at the stem of the boat?” asked Jule, in a whisper. “Well, I’m going to swim under water until I get to the black spot under that tree, where the light is shut out by the foliage and the cabin, and then I’m going to climb up on the back platform of the boat and through the window to the interior of the cabin. Any objections, Sober Sides?”