Smith Ruel Perley
The Rival Campers Afloat: or, The Prize Yacht Viking

“Pull it in aboard,” said Jack Harvey.

“No, it would be in the way,” replied Tom Harris. “Just as much obliged to you. We’ll meet you at the camp. Say that you will come ashore and eat supper with us, and Bob will have one of those fine chowders waiting for you; won’t you, Bob?”

“Ay, ay, sir,” replied Bob.

“You mean that you will cook one while we sit by and watch you, don’t you?” asked Harvey. “We shall get there before you do.”

“Perhaps not,” returned Bob. “You have got to beat down, while we push right through. It is four o’clock now, and there’s some fourteen miles to go. We can do that in about three hours, because when we get across the bay we can go close alongshore under the lee, in smooth water; while you will have to stick to the rough part of the bay most of the time.”

“All right,” said Harvey, “we will have a race to see who gets there first. But we’ll do it in half that time.”

So saying, he luffed the Viking into the wind, while Bob White drew the dancing canoe alongside. The canoeists and the yachtsmen parted company, the Viking’s sails filling with the breeze, as she quickly gathered headway, throwing the spray lightly from her bows; the canoe plunging stubbornly into the rough water, and forcing its way slowly ahead, propelled by the energy of strong young arms.

The Viking stood over on the starboard tack, while the canoe made a direct course for the island; and the two craft were soon far apart. In the course of a half-hour the canoe appeared from the deck of the Viking a mere dancing, foam-dashed object. But, in the meantime, another boat had appeared, some way ahead, that attracted the attention and interest of the yachtsmen. It was a small sailboat, carrying a mainsail and single jib. The smaller yacht was coming up to them from the direction of Grand Island, and was now running almost squarely before the wind, with its jib flapping to little purpose, save that it now and then filled for a moment on one side or the other, as the breeze happened to catch it.

“There’s a boat that is being badly sailed,” exclaimed Harvey, as the two watched its progress. “Look at it pitch; and look at that boom, how near it comes to hitting the waves every time it rolls. There’s a chap that doesn’t know enough, evidently, to top up his boom when running in a seaway. What does he think topping-lifts are made for, anyway, if not to lift the boom out of the reach of a sea like this?

“And let me tell you, running square before the wind in a heavy sea, with a boat rolling like that, is reckless business, anyway. It is much better to lay a course not quite so direct, and run with the wind not squarely astern, with the sheet hauled in some. That’s no fisherman sailing that boat.”

“It may be some one caught out who doesn’t know how to get back,” said Henry Burns. “See, there he is, waving to us. He is in some trouble or other. Let’s stand on up close to him and see what the matter is.”

“Well, I’ll take the chance,” replied Harvey. “There, he’s doing better now. He is pointing up a little bit. We’ll keep on this tack and run pretty close to him, and hail him. I’ll just sing out to him about that topping-lift, anyway; and if he doesn’t like our interfering, why he can come aboard and thrash us.”

As the sailboat drew nearer, there appeared to be a single occupant, a youth of about Harvey’s age, perhaps a year older, holding the tiller. His hat was gone and he was standing up, with hair dishevelled, glaring wildly ahead, in a confused sort of way. The boom of the sailboat was well out on the starboard side. Harvey kept the Viking on the starboard tack, and near enough to have passed quite close to the other boat.

A little too close, in fact, considering that the youth at the tiller of the oncoming boat had, indeed, completely lost his head. Suddenly, without warning, he put his tiller over so that the sailboat headed away from the Viking for an instant. Then, as the wind got back of his sail, and the boat at the same time rolled heavily in the seas, the boom jibed with terrific force. The sailboat swung in swiftly toward the starboard beam of the Viking, and the wind and sea knocked it down so that the water poured in over the side, threatening to swamp it. At the instant, Jack Harvey had thrown the Viking off the wind to avoid a crash with the other boat. The boom of the sailboat swept around with amazing swiftness, and then, as the boat careened, threatening to founder, the end of the boom brought up with a smashing blow against the Viking’s starboard quarter, breaking off several feet of the boom and tearing the sail badly.

The sailboat, half-filled with water, fell heavily into the trough of the sea and rolled threateningly; while at every pitch the boom struck the waves as though it would break again.

The Viking, under Jack Harvey’s guidance, stood away a short distance, then came about and beat up in to the wind a rod or two above the wreck.

“Get that mainsail down as quick as ever you can!” shouted Jack Harvey to the strange youth, who had dropped the tiller, and who stood now at the rail, dancing about frantically, as though he intended to jump overboard.

“I can’t,” cried the youth, tremulously. “Oh, come aboard here quick, won’t you? I’m going to sink and drown. This boat’s going down. I don’t know how to handle her.”

“We guessed that,” remarked Henry Burns, and added, reassuringly, “Don’t lose your head now. You know where the halyards are. Go ahead and get your sail down, and we’ll stand by and help you.”

Henry Burns’s calm manner seemed to instil a spark of courage into the youth. He splashed his way up to the cabin bulkhead, where the halyards were belayed on cleats on either side, and let them run. The sail dropped a little way and then stuck. The youth turned to the other boys appealingly.

“Pull up on your peak-halyard a little,” said Jack Harvey, “and let the throat drop first a way. Then the throat won’t stick.”

The youth made another attempt and the sail came nearly down, hanging in bagging folds.

“Lucky that’s not a heavy sail nor a heavy boom,” exclaimed Jack Harvey, “or the boat would be over and sunk by this time. I think I could lift the boom inboard if I could only get aboard there.”

“Here,” cried Harvey, coiling up a light, strong line that he had darted into the cabin after, “catch this and make it fast up forward – and mind you tie a knot that will hold.”

He threw the line across, and it was clutched by the boy aboard the smaller boat. The boy carried it forward and did as Harvey had directed.

“Now,” said Harvey to Henry Burns, as he made fast the line astern, “the moment we get near enough so that I can jump aboard, you bring the Viking right on her course, with a good full, so she won’t drift back on to the wreck completely.”

He, himself, held the wheel of the Viking long enough to allow the yacht to come into the wind a little. Thus it lost headway sufficiently so that the seas caused it to drift back, without its coming about or losing all steerageway. Then, as the Viking drifted within reach of the smaller boat, he leaped quickly and landed safely on the deck. At the same time, or an instant later, Henry Burns threw the wheel of the Viking over so that the yacht gathered headway again and tautened the rope that connected the two boats.

CHAPTER III.
A RESCUE UNREWARDED

Harvey, having landed on the deck of the sailboat, steadied himself by grasping the starboard stay, and took a quick, comprehensive glance over the situation. A foot and a half or so of the boom had split off from the end, and the mainsail was badly torn. The main-sheet had been snapped by the jibing of the boom, but the break in the boom was beyond the point where the sheet was fastened. The broken end of the sheet was trailing in the water. The boat could be got in hand if that were regained.

Seizing the end of the main-sheet that remained in the boat, and casting it loose from the cleat, Harvey found he had still the use of a rope of considerable length. Coiling this up, and hanging it over one arm, he regained the deck, over the small cabin, and took up his position on the port side of the boat. The stay on that side had been saved from carrying away only because the quarter of the Viking had arrested the force of the boom. Having this stay, then, to hold fast to, Harvey leaned over the side, as far as he was able, passed an end of the rope about the boom, took a turn, and made it fast.

Carrying the other end aft, Harvey handed it to the youth, who stood gazing at his efforts stupidly, evidently knowing not in the least what to do.

“Now you hold on to that,” said Harvey, “and when I tell you to, you haul as hard as ever you can.”

The youth took the rope silently and sullenly.

Harvey sprang again upon the deck, caught the flying ends of the halyards and ran the mainsail up. It was slow work, for the sail was soaked with water, and the tear in it began to rip more when the strain was brought to bear. When Harvey had hoisted the sail sufficiently so that the topping-lift would have lifted the boom, he started for that; but it had parted, and was of no use.

“Well,” said Harvey, “we’ll get the boom up a little more, with the sail, no matter if it does tear. We can’t help it.”

So he took another pull at the peak-halyard. The boom lifted a little.

“That’s enough,” said Harvey. “Now haul in on that sheet lively, before the sail tears any more. Get that boom in quick!”

The youth, with no great spirit nor heartiness in his movements, did as directed, and the boom came inboard. Then Harvey once more dropped the sail.

He was brim full of life, was Jack Harvey, and now that there was something here worth doing, and necessary to be done quickly, he was eager with the spirit of it.

“Have you got anything aboard here to bail with?” he asked, hurriedly; and, without waiting for the more sluggish movements of the other, he darted forward, through the water in the cockpit, to where he had espied a pail half-submerged under the seat. With this he began bailing furiously, dipping up the pailfuls and dashing them out over the side, as though the boat were sinking and he had but one chance for life in a hundred.

Harvey was working in this way, with never a thought of his companion, when presently there came a hail from the Viking. He paused and looked across the water to where Henry Burns was standing at the wheel of the larger craft, with a look of amusement on his face.

“I say, Jack,” called Henry Burns, drawling very slightly, as was his habit at times when other youths of more excitable temperament would speak quickly, “that other chap aboard there is just dying to help bail the boat. Why don’t you let him do his share of it?”

Harvey glanced back astern at his companion of the sailboat. What he saw caused an angry flush to spread over his face. But the next moment the cool effrontery of it made him laugh.

The youth whom Harvey’s surprised gaze rested upon was a rather tall, thin, sallow chap, with an expression on his face that looked like a perpetual sneer. He wore no yachting costume nor clothing of any sort fit for roughing it. Instead, he was rather flashily dressed, in clothes more often affected by men of sporting propensities than youths of any age. In a scarf of brilliant and gaudy tint he wore a large pin in the form of a horseshoe, with imitation brilliants in it. In fact, his dress and whole demeanour were of one who had a far more intimate knowledge of certain phases of life than he should. A telltale smear upon the fingers of his right hand told of the smoking habit, which accounted for his thin and sallow appearance – and which habit was now in evidence.

It was this latter that particularly angered Harvey, as he paused, perspiring, from his work.

The youth had seated himself calmly on the edge of the after-rail, with an elbow rested on one knee. In this comfortable attitude, and smoking a cigarette, he was aimlessly watching Harvey work.

Harvey glared for a moment in amazement. Then his face relaxed.

“I say!” he exclaimed, throwing down the pail, wiping his brow, and advancing aft toward the other youth, “this seems to be a sort of afternoon tea, or reception, with cigarettes provided by the host.”

“No, thanks,” he added, shortly, as the other reached a hand into his pocket and proffered a box of them. “You’re just too kind and generous for anything. But I don’t smoke them. Some of my crew used to. But I tell little Tim Reardon that that’s what keeps him from growing any. He’s at them all the time. Guess you are, too, by the looks of you.”

Harvey glanced rather contemptuously at the lean, attenuated arm that the other displayed, where he had rolled his cuffs back.

“Well, you don’t have to smoke them if you don’t want to,” said the other, surlily. “But don’t preach. I’m as old as you are. My smoking is my business.”

“Of course it is,” said Harvey. “I don’t care whether you smoke or not. But what I object to is your doing the smoking and letting me do the work. Your smoking is your business, and so is bailing out your own boat your business – that is, your share of it is. Now, if you want any more help from me, you just break up this smoking party and take that pail and go to bailing. I’ve got enough to keep me busy while you are doing that.”

The youth glanced angrily at Harvey, but made no reply. Harvey’s stalwart figure forbade any unpleasant retort. Sullenly, he tossed away the half-finished cigarette, slumped down once more into the cockpit, took up the pail that Harvey had dropped, and went to work.

“He looks like a real man now,” called out Henry Burns.

The youth, with eyes flashing, shot one glance at the smiling face of Henry Burns, but deigned no reply.

Harvey, without further notice of his companion, proceeded to hoist the sail a little so that he could take two reefs in it. This brought the sail down so small as to include the torn part in that tied in. The sail would, therefore, answer for the continuation of the trip.

“Say,” asked Harvey finally, “why didn’t you reef before, when it began to blow up fresh and the sea got a bit nasty? You might have saved all this.”

The youth hesitated, glanced at Harvey sheepishly, and mumbled something that sounded like he didn’t know why he hadn’t.

“Hm!” said Harvey, under his breath. “He didn’t know enough.

“Well,” he continued, after a little time, “you’re all right to start off again, if you think you can get along. That sail is down so small it won’t give you any more trouble, and there is plenty of it to keep headway on the boat; that is, if you are going on up the bay. Where are you bound for, anyway?”

“Up to Springton,” replied the other. “Straight ahead.”

“All right,” said Harvey, “you can get there if you will only be a little more careful. Don’t try to run straight for the town. Keep off either way – do you see?” And Harvey designated how the other could run in safety.

“Run on one course a way,” he said, continuing, “and then put her about and run on the other. But look out and don’t jibe her. Let her come about into the wind. Now do you think you can get along?”

“Yes,” answered the youth, shortly. He had by this time finished his bailing, and the cockpit floor was fairly free of water.

“Well, then, I’ll bid you an affectionate farewell,” said Harvey, who had taken mental note of the fact that the youth had not offered to thank him for all his trouble. “Sorry to leave you, but the best of friends must part, you know. Good day.”

“Good day,” answered the youth, without offering even to shake hands.

Harvey lost little time in regaining the deck of the Viking. Henry Burns was still smiling as Harvey took the wheel from him.

“We seem to have made a very pleasant acquaintance,” he said.

“Haven’t we though!” exclaimed Harvey. “If we were only in some nice, quiet harbour, where the water wasn’t very deep, I’d just see whether that young chap can swim or not. He’d get one ducking – ”

“Oh, by the way,” called Henry Burns, as the two boats were separating, “you’re entirely welcome to our assistance, you know. You needn’t write us a letter thanking us. We know your feelings are just too deep for thanks.”

“Little thanks I owe you,” snarled the other boy. “’Twas all your fault, anyway. If you had kept off, my boat wouldn’t have gone over.”

Jack Harvey sprang from his seat and shook his fist in the direction of the disappearing boat.

“Hold on there, Jack,” said Henry Burns, catching him by the arm. “Don’t get excited. Do you know the answer to what he just said? Well, there isn’t any. Just smile and wave your hand to him, as I do. He’s really funnier than Squire Brackett.”

“Oh, yes, it is funny,” answered Jack Harvey, scowling off astern. “It’s so funny it makes me sick. But perhaps you’d think it was funnier still, if you had gone at that bailing the way I did, and had looked up all of a sudden and seen that chap sitting back there at his ease, smoking. I’ll just laugh about it for the rest of the week. That’s what I will.”

Jack Harvey certainly did not appear to be laughing.

“Above all things,” he said at length, “what do you suppose he meant by saying it was our fault? That’s the last straw for me. We didn’t jibe his boat for him.”

“No,” said Henry Burns, “but he probably owns the bay, and was mad to see us sailing on it. He acted that way.”

“Well, it has cost us about an hour and a half good time,” exclaimed Harvey – “though I should not begrudge it if he hadn’t acted the way he did. We won’t win that race in to Southport, by a long shot. It’s about half-past six o’clock, and we cannot make it in less than two hours and a half, even if the wind holds.”

This latter condition expressed by Harvey was, indeed, to prove most annoying. With the dropping of the sun behind the far-distant hills, the wind perceptibly and rapidly diminished. They set their club-topsail to catch the upper airs, but the last hour was sluggish sailing. It was a few minutes to ten o’clock when the Viking rounded the bluff that guards the northeastern entrance to the snug harbour of Southport.

“There’s no show for that warm supper to-night, I’m afraid,” said Harvey, as they turned the bluff and stood slowly into the harbour.

The immediate answer to this remark was an “Ahoy, there, on board the Viking!” from across the water. The next moment, the familiar canoe shot into sight and Tom Harris and Bob White were quickly on deck.

“We beat you fellows by a few minutes,” said Tom Harris, laughing at Harvey.

“Look out for Jack,” said Henry Burns, with a wink at the other two. “He has been having so much fun that he doesn’t want any more. And, besides, he’s starving – and so am I; and we might eat little boys up if they plague us.”

“Why, what’s the matter?” asked Tom, observing that Harvey was half-scowling as he smiled at Henry Burns’s sally.

“Oh, we have been entertaining a friend up the bay,” answered Henry Burns, “and he didn’t appreciate what Jack did for him. Seriously now, I don’t blame Jack for being furious.” And Henry Burns gave a graphic account of the adventure.

When he had finished, both Tom Harris and Bob White gave vent to whistles of surprise.

“Say,” exclaimed Bob White, “you couldn’t guess who that young chap is, if you tried a hundred years.”

“Why, do you know him, then?” cried Jack Harvey.

“Yes, and you will know him, too, before the summer is over,” replied Bob White. “That’s Harry Brackett, Squire Brackett’s son.”

“Didn’t know he had any,” exclaimed Harvey.

“Neither did we till this summer,” said Bob White. “He dropped in on us one day, early, and wanted to borrow some money. That was up in Benton. He said he must have it, to get right back to Southport; and Tom’s father let him have a little. But we saw him several days after that driving about the streets with a hired rig. So that’s where the money went, and I think Mr. Harris will never see the money again. He’s been off to school for two years, so he says; but if he has learned anything except how to smoke, he doesn’t show it.

“But, never mind that now,” added Bob. “Let’s get the Viking in to anchorage and made snug, for you know there’s something waiting for you over to the camp.”

“What! You don’t mean you have kept supper waiting for us all this time?” cried Henry Burns, joyfully.

“Oh, but you are a pair of bricks!” exclaimed Harvey, as Bob White nodded an affirmative. “I can smell that fish chowder that Bob makes clear out here.”

A few minutes later, the four boys, weighting the canoe down almost to the gunwales, were gliding in it across the water to a point of land fronting the harbour, where, through the darkness, the vague outlines of a tent were to be discerned. Soon the canoe grazed along a shelf of ledge, upon which they stepped. Tom Harris sprang up the bank and vanished inside the tent. Then the light of a lantern shone out, illuminating the canvas, and Tom Harris, as host, stood in the doorway, holding aside the flap for them to enter.

Inside the tent, which had a floor of matched boards, freighted down from up the river for the purpose, it was comfortable and cosy. Along either side, a bunk was set up, made of spruce poles, with boards nailed across, and hay mattresses spread over these. There were two roughly made chairs, which, with the bunks, provided sufficient seats for all. At the farther end of the tent, on a box, beside another big wooden box that served for a locker, was an oil-stove, which was now lighted and upon which there rested an enormous stew-pan.

The cover being removed from this, there issued forth an aroma of fish chowder that brought a broad grin even to the face of Jack Harvey.

“Hooray!” he yelled, grasping Bob White about the waist, giving him a bearlike embrace, and releasing him only to bestow an appreciative blow upon his broad back. “It’s the real thing. It’s one of Bob’s best. It is a year since I had one, but I remember it like an old friend.”

“You get the first helping, for the compliment,” said Bob White, ladle in hand.

“And only to think,” said Henry Burns, some moments later, as he leaned back comfortably, spoon in hand, “that that was Squire Brackett’s son we helped out of the scrape. He certainly has the squire’s pleasing manner, hasn’t he, Jack?”

“Henry,” replied Jack Harvey, solemnly, “don’t you mention that young Brackett again to me to-night. If you do, I’ll put sail on the Viking and go out after him.”

“Then I won’t say another word,” exclaimed Henry Burns. “For my part, I hope never to set eyes on him again.”

Unfortunately, that wish was not to be gratified.