“The canoes!”
The spot where they had drawn them up was near the margin of the sea and the heavy waves that the approaching storm would stir up would be sure to swamp them if they were not moved from their present position.
“Come on, boys, we’ve got to hurry,” shouted Ben, and followed by the young adventurers he dashed off down the trail that the others had traversed a few minutes previously. They reached the shore just in time to hear three shrill blasts from the released captive’s whistle. He was in his small boat about a hundred yards off shore and looking anxiously about. He had good reason to. The thunder-growls were coming nearer, and far to the south, across the dark cloud curtains, great jagged flashes of lightning were ripping and tearing. The sea, too, was beginning to rise with that peculiar moaning sound that precedes a mighty disturbance of its waters. The rain fell in torrents that whitened the surface of the sea.
The work of getting the canoes hauled into a safe place was soon performed, more especially as they had the aid of several of the moonshiners who had accompanied them to the beach to see the last of the man they would have cheerfully hanged a few minutes before. The small craft were hardly snugly stowed when round the point through the downpour, glided the motor-boat. She was low and long and painted dull black and must have been equipped with powerful engines for she shot through the water like a snake. The man in the dinghy soon clambered on board and turned to wave farewell to the soaking group of watchers on the beach.
“Gee! I’d give a hundred dollars for an umbrella,” remarked Billy.
“I hope that’s his good-bye and not au revoir,” remarked Lathrop. “I think you let him off much too easy, Frank,” he added.
“So do I,” put in Lathrop, “he really deserved some punishment.”
“What were we to do?” asked Frank. “Anyhow if he doesn’t keep his word we know his measure now and can look out for him and see he doesn’t get off so easy next time. Besides, if we had left him here these moonshiners would have been sure to have killed him. Ben Stubbs told me they don’t hesitate to make away with any stranger——-”
“Who hasn’t got a letter of introduction,” Billy finished for him.
“Well, it’s a good thing we had a sponsor, or we might have been ornamenting the foliage.”