How long he slept he had no means of knowing, but when he awakened again the cave was empty, save for Seth, who sat at the table whiling away the time by hacking something out of a bit of wood with his knife. At last Seth began to blink and wink, and apparently in order to keep awake, he walked over to where Nat lay, seemingly still wrapped in slumber.
“Humph!” Nat heard him say to himself after a long inspection, “that younker’s good for twelve hours’ snoozing after that stuff pop gave him to make him sleep. I reckon there’s no harm if I take forty winks myself. Anyhow, there’s no chance of his getting away.”
So saying, he slouched back to the table, and burying his face in his hands, dropped off into what, to judge by his snores, must have been a sleep as deep as the one from which Nat had just awakened. Nat waited for a while to let Seth get well into the land of Nod and then, with his heart beating like a pneumatic riveter, he arose and crept cautiously toward the small boat he had observed earlier in the night.
For one moment the wild idea of taking the motor boat had flashed through his mind, but he abandoned the idea as it was pretty certain that either Seth or old Israel had pocketed the switch blade or otherwise made it impossible to start her without their knowledge. As he cautiously made his way to the edge of the platform and toward the small boat, Nat found himself wondering what had become of the others. The motor boat was still there, so that obviously they could not have used her in their departure.
Nat dropped into the small boat and cast her off without Seth’s stirring.—Page 151.
“There must be some other way out of the cave,” thought Nat. “Don’t I wish I knew where it is? But with luck this way will prove just as well, provided Seth doesn’t take it into his head and wake up.”
Nat dropped into the small boat and cast her off without Seth’s stirring.
The tide must have been setting out, for the boat at once drifted away from the platform toward the mouth of the cavern. The boy had drifted some distance before he thought it safe to take to the oars. Right there and then he made a startling discovery. Small wonder the boat had been left unguarded. There were no oars in it!
“Great Scotland!” exclaimed Nat in a voice of consternation, “this is worse and then some! However, I’m in for it now and must make the best of it, but, in case Seth wakes and takes after me with the motor boat, I’m a goner, sure.”