Crossing the deck the boy slipped easily between the partly raised hatch cover and the combing, and down the stationary iron ladder into the dark hold. As he did so a ray of light appeared in the hitherto dark hold. Glancing around to be sure that neither Dublin nor Rae were standing sentinel for the young marauder, Jack slipped noiselessly over the deck, and followed Monkey down the ladder.
A glance showed him that what Monkey carried in his right hand was a portable electric light and with this he was carefully searching for the marks upon some packing cases.
Jack tiptoed quietly toward him, intending to take him unawares, failing in his eagerness to make the capture to allow Monkey to make an attack upon the case with his hatchet sufficiently to “clinch” his evidence.
Just as Jack put out his hand to grasp the arm that held the hatchet his foot struck an unseen coil of rope, and he plunged head foremost into Monkey. The latter pitched forward three or four steps and Jack landed on his hands and knees, an accident that probably saved him serious injury, for at the moment the terror-stricken Monkey turned and aimed a furious blow at whatever had struck him.
At the same time he dropped the electric light, which promptly went out as the spring was released, and the hold was in darkness. Jack dared not move for fear of the hatchet, and all he could hear was the loud breathing of the terrified Monkey, who carefully began to grope for the lost lamp. The search was vain, and Jack was slowly backing away from the vicinity toward the ladder, intending to bar Monkey’s egress when he heard a movement that seemed to indicate that Monkey was climbing up the piled-up freight. Then there were two loud blows with the hatchet on the deck above them which formed the floor of the steerage quarters.
Scarcely a minute passed before a man with another electric light swarmed down the ladder, and Jack was in the hands of the powerful Dublin. At the same moment, Monkey dropped his hatchet and dashed past them to the ladder, where he hung like his simian namesake, calling shrilly for the night watchman. Jack made an effort to twist himself loose from the hands of Dublin, but in vain.
“What are ye doin’ down here, ye thief? Tryin’ to get at the cargo? Call the quartermaster there, Monkey.”
Realizing the trap into which he had fallen, Jack made no further effort to release himself until he reached the deck above, when he jerked away from Dublin and faced the quartermaster and the watchman. There they were joined by Rae and some of the other steerage passengers.
“Well, well; if it ain’t one o’ them boy Scouts; them amateur soldiers. Where d’ye find him, Monkey?”
“I seen him hanging round this deck and when he slipped down in the hold with a hatchet and a ’lectric light. I followed him. He jumped onto me and I run back to the ladder and yelled for Dublin, and he come and got him.”