CHAPTER XXI.
MOTOR-SCOOTERS TO THE RESCUE.
“Great guns, we’re too late!” groaned Merritt.
“No. See! she’s not awash yet,” cried Rob. “Look! they are climbing into her rigging. Come on, fellows, run as you never ran before.”
It was hard work plowing along that soft beach with the bitter wind fighting them every inch of the way, but the Boy Scouts stuck to it doggedly. Before long they were opposite the turmoil of waters in which the unfortunate schooner lay.
To their astonishment, however, she was not in such a desperate plight as had at first seemed the case. Her decks were still unswept by the waves, although, occasionally, a big sea would break against her side and fling a smother of spray almost as big as her topmasts.
“She’s stuck on that sandy shoal the captain told us about,” said Rob comprehendingly. “It runs along the beach here at just about the distance she lies off shore.”
“I wish those life savers were here with their gun,” exclaimed Tubby. “We’ve got lots of rope here, but how are we going to reach them?”
This problem, however, was solved more easily than they imagined. A bearded man clambered into the lee rigging as he spied the party on the shore, and, after a dozen attempts, succeeded in flinging a light line with a leaden weight attached to it to the beach. The wind helped him, or otherwise he could not have succeeded, but as it happened, Providence was good to the stranded schooner in this respect, at least.
Seizing up the light line, the boys ran back on the beach with it, and guided by the man’s gesticulations, they began to haul on it for all they were worth. Presently it was seen that a heavier line was attached to the first one, and was evidently intended to serve as a life rope between the vessel and the shore.
The lads cast about them for some place to which to make the line fast. Soon they spied the gaunt framework of an old range light, long disused. The timbers seemed stout, however, and in a jiffy they had the line fastened with two double half hitches on the uprights. In the meantime, the men on the schooner had made their end fast.