To an experienced skipper, however, the Galoups held no particular terrors. All that was needful was familiarity with the intricacies of their currents and whirlpools and they could be “run” in perfect safety. During the three months that the Border Boys had been the guests of Mr. Stetson at his summer home on Dexter Island, some miles below, they had gained the necessary skill to negotiate the racing, tumbling Glues. Aside from the fact that he had ordered the engines of his father’s fast craft, the River Swallow, slowed down as they approached the place, and that his hands gripped the steering wheel more tightly, Ralph Stetson, only son of King Pin Stetson, the Railroad Magnate, felt no particular qualms as the whitecaps of the rollicking Glues appeared out of the darkness ahead.
The River Swallow was a narrow, sharp-stemmed motor boat which had more than once successfully defended her title of the fastest craft on the St. Lawrence. She was about sixty feet in length, painted a gleaming, lustrous black, with luxuriously fitted cabins and engines of the finest type obtainable, which drove her twin propellers at twelve hundred revolutions a minute. No wonder the boys, who, since their sojourn on the island, had become adepts at handling her, enjoyed their positions as captain and crew of the craft.
One of the two paid hands, who berthed forward, came up to Ralph just as the latter reached out for the simple mechanism which controlled the powerful search-light mounted near the steering wheel.
The boy had decided to use the rays of the great lamp in picking out his course. In one or two places big rocks bristled menacingly out of the boiling rapids, and if the craft should happen to strike one of them, even with a glancing blow, a terrible accident would be almost certain to result. But with his search-light to act as a night-raking eye, Ralph felt small fear of anything of the sort occurring.
The man who came up to Ralph, just as a sharp click sounded and the bright scimitar of electric light, its power increased by reflectors, slashed the night, was a rather remarkable looking man to be an ordinary paid hand on a wealthy man’s pleasure boat.
Fully six feet in height, powerfully built and erect, he had at first glance a look of refinement and intelligence that did not, somehow, appear to blend well with the somewhat inferior position he occupied. It is true that it was honest, clean employment, of which no decent man need have been ashamed, but Ralph felt every time he looked at him that Roger Malvin—such was the name the man gave—might have secured some more suitable occupation.
Yet the first favorable impression that Malvin gave did not, for some reason, survive closer acquaintanceship. Underlying his air of frank intelligence was something else that Ralph had not so far been able to understand. There was something almost sneaking and furtive about Malvin at times. But Ralph, loath at any time to distrust any of those with whom he was thrown in contact, decided that probably this was a mere peculiarity of manner with no foundation behind it.
The other paid hand seemed a less complex person. Olaf Hansen was a short, rather insignificant looking little Norwegian, with light blue eyes, a ruddy complexion and a shock of yellow hair. He appeared to be rather under the sway of Malvin, who, before the boys had arrived, had had command of the River Swallow. Whether or not Malvin held any grudge against them for assuming charge of the boat and depriving him of the easy berth he had enjoyed, Ralph was not able to determine; but once or twice he had noticed little things about the man which more than half inclined him to the belief that such was the case. If this were actually so, Malvin had so far adopted no active measures of reprisal and obeyed orders with alacrity and willingness, just as he might have done had he always “berthed forward” in the cramped quarters assigned to the crew of the River Swallow.
“Want a hand to get through the Gallops, sir?” he asked respectfully as he came to Ralph’s side.
“No, thank you, Malvin,” was the rejoinder. “I guess by this time I’m enough of a skipper to take her through without any trouble.”