CHAPTER XVIII
JOE DIGBY MISSING
"Merritt! Merritt, wake up!"
The boy sleepily opened his eyes and saw bending over him the palefeatures of Rob, whose voice quivered with suppressed excitement as heshook the other's shoulder.
"I didn't hear reveille blow yet. What's up? Have I overslept?"murmured the young corporal.
"No, it's not six-thirty yet--barely after half past four, in fact.But young Digby--he had the night watch, you know--and was to have beenrelieved at three o'clock. Well, Ernest Thompson, his relief, rousedout at that hour, but not a trace of Digby was to be found!"
"What!" The sleepy boy was drowsy no longer. "Digby gone?"
"Hush! We don't know yet. Don't wake any of the others. Thompson andI have skirmished around ever since it began to get light, and we havenot been able to find a trace of him."
Merritt was out of his cot while his leader was still speaking, and tenminutes later, during which time the boys exchanged excited questionsand answers, he was in his uniform and outside the tent.
The sun was just poking his rim above the western horizon and thechilly damp of early dawn lay over the island. The sea, as calm almostas a lake, lay sullen and gray, scarcely heaving. Behind the sleepingcamp a few shreds of mist--the ghosts of the vapors of the night werearising like smoke among the dim trees. At the further end of theassemblage of tents, and beyond the smoldering fire, stood a silentfigure, that of Ernest Thompson.
"Have you explored the island thoroughly?" asked Merritt under hisbreath. Somehow the dim hour and the situation seemed to preclude theidea of loud talking.
"Of course not. Not yet," breathed the other in the same tones. "Wewill break the news to the rest of the Patrol after breakfast. It's nouse alarming them yet."
"It isn't possible that he went off on an early fishing expedition?"
For answer, Rob waved his hand toward the water, where the Flying Fishlay rocking gently at her anchor. Ashore the dingy lay as Merritt andhis companions had left it the night before.
"But what can have happened to him?" burst out Merritt, as they madetheir way over to Ernest Thompson's side.
"I cannot think. It is absolutely mystifying. I am going to start forthe captain's place now. He may be able to throw some light on theaffair."
Merritt shook his head.
"Hardly likely. If there is no trace of Joe Digby on this side of theisland, it is improbable that Captain Hudgins knows anything about him."
"Well," rejoined Rob in a troubled voice, "we've got to try everything.I am responsible for his safe keeping while he is in camp. I blamemyself for allowing the kid to go on sentry duty at all."
"No use doing that," comforted Merritt; "there's one thing sure, hecan't have melted away. He must be somewhere on the island. There areno wild beasts or anything like that here to carry him off, so if wekeep up the search we must come upon him sooner or later."
"That's what makes the whole affair the more mystifying," rejoined Rob."What can have become of him?"
"Well, if he's on the island, we'll find him," he continued; "and if heisn't--"
"We'll find him anyway," declared Merritt in a determined voice.
"That's the stuff!" warmly exclaimed the other. "And now I'm going totake a cruise round to the other side of the island, and see if I canfind out anything there."
A few seconds later he was in the dinghy and sculling out over thewater to the speedy Flying Fish. In a short time he was off.
As the "chug chug" of the motor grew fainter, Merritt turned to youngThompson.
"Don't breathe a word of this to the others till we know for certainthat Digby has vanished," he said.
The other boy nodded.
"I understand," he said, and the look with which he accompanied thewords rendered Merritt perfectly confident that he would be obeyed.
"And now let's rouse out Andy Bowles and get him busy with that tinhorn of his," cheerfully went on Merritt, walking toward Andy's tent.
That youth was much surprised to find that it was morning, but tumbledout of his cot in double-quick time, and soon the cheerful notes ofreveille were ringing out over the camp, on which the sun's rays werenow streaming down in that luminary's cheerful morning way.
The soldier who immortalized himself by sing the words: "We can't get'em up, We can't get 'em up, We can't get 'em up in the morning--, Wecan't get 'em up, We can't get 'em up, We can't get'em up ata-a-l-l-l!" to the stirring notes of the army's morning call had neverbeen in a camp of Boy Scouts. If he had he wouldn't have written them,for before the last notes had died away the camp was alive and astir,with hurrying lads filling tin washbasins and cleaning up.
The cook and "cookee" for the day--Jim Jeffords and Martin Green--soonhad their cooking fire going, and presently the appetizing aroma ofcoffee and fried ham and eggs filled the camp.
"Give the breakfast call, Andy," ordered Merritt, as the proud ifflush-faced cooks announced their labors complete, and with a clatterand bang of tin dishes and cups the Boy Scouts sat down to breakfast.
"Where's Rob and Digby?" demanded Andy Bowles, as he dug his spoon intoan island of oatmeal completely surrounded by an ocean of condensedmilk thinned down with warm water.
The moment that Merritt had dreaded had arrived.
"Why, he and Rob went off early to see the captain," he said. "I guessthey'll be back soon."
"Pretty early for paying social calls," commented Andy, too busy withhis breakfast, however, to give the matter more attention, for whichMerritt was duly thankful.
After breakfast Merritt ordered a general airing of bedding, and theside walls of the tents were raised to let the fresh air blow throughthem. Still there was no sign of Rob. Merritt grew so anxious that hecould hardly keep from pacing up and down to conceal his nervous stateof mind. However, he stuck to his duties and oversaw the first routineof the morning without betraying his anxiety to any of the lads underhis charge. At last there came the awaited chug chug of the returningboat, for which he had been so eagerly listening, and Rob appearedrounding the little point below the camp. In the craft was anotherfigure, that of the captain himself.
Merritt's first hope when he saw the two persons in the boat--namely,that one of them might be the missing boy--was promptly dashed, and heinstinctively guessed by Rob's silence as he dropped the anchor and heand the captain tumbled into the dinghy that there had been no news.
"No," said Rob, shaking his head dejectedly as they reached the shore,"there isn't anything to tell. The captain is as much in the dark aswe."
"Well, you'd better have some breakfast," said Merritt, after he andthe captain had exchanged greetings, "then we can go ahead and notifythe others and institute a thorough search."
"That's the stuff, my boy," agreed the veteran. "Overhaul ship frombilge ter royals, and if not found, then take a cruise in search uv."
Rob ate his meal with small appetite, but the captain, urging on hisyoung companion the necessity of "filling his hold," devouredprodigious quantities of food, and then, arising, suggested that thetime had come to "pipe all hands aft and read orders."
The boys had been so busy about their morning tasks that fortunatelynone of them, except Tubby, whom Merritt had told of the disappearance,had found time to notice Rob's return or ask questions; so that when heannounced to them that Joe Digby was missing it came as a stunningshock.
"Now, boys," said Rob, after he had communicated the full details, sofar as he knew them, of the circumstances of the disappearance, "thereis only one thing to do, and that is turn this island inside out. Itwon't take long, but I want it done thoroughly. Don't leave a stoneunturned. If after a painstaking search we find nothing on the island,we'll know we have to look elsewhere. You are all fairly good woodsmenby this time, and can trail by signs as effectively as first-classscouts. Use your eyes, and good luck."
Merritt at once assigned searching parties, he and Rob and Tubby takingthe center of the island and the oth
ers being detailed to search alongthe shores in two separate squads for any trace of their missingcomrade.
"Call me a lubber if this ain't the most mystifyin' thing I've run mybow into since the Two Janes, uv Boston, brig, lost her bearings in afog and fetched up off Iceland," declared the captain, who had electedto accompany the three leaders of the Patrol. "But drown or swim, sailor sink, we'll find that kid if he's on deck."
The searching parties construed this speech as a sort of valedictory tothem as, indeed, the captain intended it--and greeted it with a cheer.
"The first scout that finds a trace of Joe is to light the four'smokes', meaning come to council," was Rob's last order. "Light themon as prominent a place as you can find and we will all meet in camp tohear the news."
The searching parties at once separated, one striking off to the right,the other to the left and the three young leaders and their grizzledfriend making a dead set for the center of the island.
If Joe Digby was to be found, the look of determination on the face ofeach scout showed that it would not be the fault of his young comradesif he were not.