CHAPTER X. THE DESERTED SHANTY BOAT.
"Nobody home, Thad!" remarked Giraffe presently.
"It looks that way," admitted the patrol leader, for the light of thelittle lamp allowed them to see every part of the interior; and some ofthe scouts had even bent down to look under the table, and behind an oldtrunk, without result.
"If he's stepped out to go on an errand down the road, where there may besome sort of a house, it looks queer to me that he'd leave his suppercooking on the stove here," and as Allan said this he pushed back afrying pan that seemed to contain fried potatoes so nearly done theywould have started to burn in a few more minutes.
"Gosh! don't this mystery beat everything!" Bumpus was heard to mutter;and since the stout scout seldom expressed himself forcibly it couldeasily be understood that he was now well worked up; at the same time hewarmed his hands by the fire, and even stooped down to take a closerwhiff of the cooking food which must have appealed irresistibly to ahungry scout, who was also reckoned a champion feeder.
"He'd better be hurrying back, then," Step Hen interposed, "if he don'twant to get his jacket wet, because she's started in to rain, boys, youhear!"
Sure enough, they caught the increasing patter of descending drops on theroof of the cabin, showing that the long-delayed storm had broken boundsat last.
"Woof! talk to me about luck, we've got it in big chunks," said Giraffe,grinning, as he relieved himself of his haversack, and immediately beganto open the same, as though bent on considering their own supper.
"How kind of the storm," said Smithy; "it held off until we had run uponthis haven of refuge. I hope now the owner will allow us to stay with himover night, for it would break my heart to have to step out of thiscomfortable place into the nasty wet."
"Don't worry, Smithy," asserted Giraffe; "it'd have to be a charge ofdynamite that'd hoist me out of this. Possession is nine points of thelaw, they say; and we're here to stay, even if we have to pay threeprices for accommodations. And I want to tell you that with that jollyfire so handy we'll be silly to delay getting our own supper ready."
"Don't bother with what is on the stove," warned Thad; "only shove itback, for when the owner of the boat does come home he'll want it. Plentyof room for our purpose, isn't there, boys?"
They assured him on this point, and then both Giraffe and Bumpus busiedthemselves. The contents of the various haversacks soon disclosed aquantity of eatables, and the cooking of supper was deemed a "snap" bythose in charge, since they had the rare privilege of doing their work ona real stove, with plenty of wood handy.
Let the rain beat upon the roof overhead, until it made such a racketthey had at times to fairly shout in order to be heard--who cared, with acabin to shield them from the fury of the storm?
Thad hardly anticipated that the absent owner of the boat would returnwhile the rain was coming down in such torrents, though if it relaxed itsviolence later on they might expect to see him. Some of the other boysdid not have quite so much confidence, for whenever there was a suddenmovement of the boat, as some gust of wind struck the upper end, the morenervous ones would hastily glance toward the door, as though halfexpecting to see it thrown open, and an angry boatman push in, demandingto know what they meant by taking possession during his absence.
But supper was cooked and placed upon the table without any interruptionof this sort taking place. There was not room for them all to gatheraround the table; indeed, they filled the small cabin pretty well, eightof them in space that was really intended for two or three; but that didnot interfere with everyone getting his share of food, though he had tosit cross-legged like a Turk on the floor to devour it.
All of them were in fairly high spirits now. The solving of the problemas to where they were to find shelter from the storm did considerable tolift them to this plane. Then again the enjoyment they found insatisfying their hunger with good things had its share, as well as thewarmth of the cabin, which was certainly a feature worth considering.
Supper done, and still no let-up to the downfall of rain, which wasbeating the liveliest kind of a tattoo upon the roof. Thad was glad todiscover no signs of a leak anywhere, which spoke well for the tidinessof the owner.
Giraffe, noticing how Thad looked up and around, must have guessed whatthe other was thinking about, to judge from the remark he made.
"No use talking, Thad, the chap who owns this boat can't be that Irishmanwho when some one asked him why he didn't mend his leaky roof said thatwhen the weather was dry he didn't think to bother with it; and when itrained why he couldn't mend it. This one is as tight as a drum. We're alucky lot of scouts again; and I'm only sorry that the mysterious ownerisn't here to enjoy the hospitality of the shanty boat."
Once Thad walked over to the door, which he found could be secured insidewith a bar. It also had a padlock on the outside, showing that it mightbe the habit of the owner when he left his home for a time to fasten itsecurely.
"I'm glad that padlock wasn't in use when we struck here," remarkedAllan, who had followed the leader over. "We'd have been compelled tobreak in, and that's a serious offense against the law, if you're caught,though we'd have left money to pay for our housing."
Thad opened the door, and they looked out into the pitch darkness of thenight, though neither of them essayed to step beyond the sill. The stormwas now in full blast, and the river seemed to be rushing past the mooredshanty boat with foam on the little waves formed by the sweeping wind.
"Looks pretty ugly, doesn't it?" said Thad.
"I never would have believed the Susquehanna could get on such a rampageas this," Allan remarked in turn. "I always had an idea it was a peacefulsort of river, with beautiful banks, and the canal running along inplaces parallel to the river; but I declare you'd think it was the bigMississippi right now, what we can see of it, from the way our lightshines on the water."
"It's on the boom, you know," Thad told him, "and there's an unusualamount of water in the channel; but from the way the rain's coming downit'll be a flood before twenty-four hours, if ever there was one alonghere."
"Lucky we struck a boat then, instead of some shanty close to the bank;because in that case, Thad, we might have been washed away beforemorning, as the river kept on rising a foot an hour perhaps."
Thad closed the door again.
"Looks a whole lot better inside than out," he observed, "which makes mefeel glad we're not cowering under a branch shelter, and taking aducking. Even with the rubber blankets we couldn't expect to keep halfway dry when it's pelting down as steady as that."
"I've been trying to figure out what happened here," said Allan. "Therewas some man in this cabin, and he was getting supper when we gave thatfirst shout. Now, it might be he looked out, and glimpsing a bunch offellows in khaki suits and carrying guns, running this way, he thought wewere soldiers. He may have had some good reason for not wanting to meetup with the State troops, and so cut and ran for it. That's the thingI've made my mind up to."
"And according to my way of thinking you're close to the truth, Allan,"he was told by the patrol leader.
"I noticed that you dropped that bar in place, Thad, after you'd shut thedoor; what was the idea of doing that?"
"Well, it doesn't seem to be just the right thing, fastening a man's owndoor against him," laughed the other; "but as we all want to get somesleep to-night, being tired, I thought it might be best to fix things sowe'd have ample warning if the owner of the boat did turn up. Let himknock, and we'll be only too glad to open up; only we don't want him towalk in on us and catch us napping. There's no telling how unpleasant hemight make it for us."
This sound reasoning appealed favorably to Allan.
"The window you see has got a stout iron bar across it," he went on tosay; "and a fellow would have the time of his life trying to crawlthrough such a small space; so it's all right; we can lie down to sleepwithout worrying."
They were in fact pretty well played out, having been
up a good part ofthe previous night, it will be remembered, and the day's tramp had beenanything but a picnic to certain members of the party who need not bementioned by name.
Accordingly, about an hour after they had finished supper there began tobe a movement on foot looking to finding accommodations for spreadingblankets on the hard floor of the cabin.
Space was somewhat at a premium, since there were eight of the scouts.The owner of the shanty boat had some sort of contraption in the way of acot which in the daytime could be fastened up against the wall, and inthis manner avoid taking up a considerable amount of space, to be droppedwhen needed. None of the boys considered for a moment using that cot, allof them preferring to make sure of the protection of their own cleanblankets on the floor.
Bumpus, while very tired, was afraid that he might not get to sleep aseasily as he would have liked, because of the way his mind was worked up.Giraffe, in talking about matters, had happened to suggest that possiblythe man owning the boat may have been seized with a fit when he wasstooping over to draw some water from the river in a bucket, and hadfallen overboard; and the thought of such a terrible thing happeningfilled the mind of tender-hearted Bumpus, who never liked to see anyonesuffer if he could help it.
But although the roar of the storm and the dash of the waves against theside of the boat, causing it to rock from time to time, bothered some ofthe scouts in the beginning, they finally grew more accustomed to thechorus of sounds, and in the end all of them slept as only exhausted boysmay.
Thad had remained awake after the last of his chums yielded to the drowsyfeeling that overcame them; but finally he, too, found forgetfulness insleep.
He was aroused by some one clutching him desperately, and realized thatGiraffe, who chanced to have lain down alongside the leader, was callinghis name wildly.
All was darkness around them, for they had seen fit to put out the littlelamp, wishing to save the oil as much as possible. The bellowing stormstill held full sway without, and while there had been no thunder andlightning, as must have been the case had it happened in midsummer, theforces of Nature were fiercely contending, and combined to make aterrible noise.
But Thad immediately became aware of the fact that there was a new motionto the shanty boat on which they had found such welcome refuge. It rockedviolently, and pitched very much after the manner of a bucking bronchotrying to unseat a rider.
Thad could give a quick guess what this signified, though it chilled himto the very marrow to realize the new horror that had come upon them.
The other boys were all aroused by now, even Bumpus, who usually had tobe rolled violently before he would open his eyes; and their variousexclamations of alarm began to be heard all around him in the gloom ofthe cabin interior.
"What is it, Thad?"
"My stars! just feel the old boat jumping, would you?"
"I'm beginning to be seasick already!" complained Smithy.
"Thad, what d'ye think, has she broken away from her moorings?" demandedGiraffe; and the anxious listeners felt a shock when they heard thepatrol leader reply:
"I'm afraid that's just what's happened, boys, and that we're adrift onthe flood."