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<h2 id="id00123" style="margin-top: 4em">CHAPTER II</h2> <h5 id="id00124">A BOLD STROKE REWARDED</h5> Bacon grease was spilled and toast burned in the preparation of breakfast, which was devoured in gulps. Then, with some misgivings but much determination, the two girls hurried away up the beach in the direction from whence had come the pop-popping of their stolen motorboat. Coming at last to the place where sandy shore was replaced by ragged bowlders, they began making their way through the tangled mass of underbrush, fallen tree-trunks and ferns, across the point of land which cut them off from the next sandy beach. "This would be splendid if it wasn't so serious," said Marian as they reached the crest of the ridge and prepared to descend. "I always did like rummaging about in an unexplored wilderness. Look at that fallen yellow-pine; eight feet through if it is an inch; and the ferns are almost tall enough to hide it. And look at those tamaracks down in that gully; they look like black knights. Wouldn't they make a picture?" "Not just now; come on," exclaimed Lucile, who was weary of battling with the jungle. "Let's get down to the beach and see what's there. There's a long stretch of beach, I think, maybe half a mile. But we must be careful how we make our way down. We might discover something—and we might be discovered first." To descend a rock-ribbed hill, overgrown with tangled underbrush and buried in decaying tree-trunks, is hardly easier than to ascend it. Both girls were thoroughly out of breath as they finally parted the branches of a fir tree and peered through to where the beach, a yellow ribbon of sand, circled away to the north. "Not there," whispered Marian. Lucile gripped her cousin's arm. "What's that thing two-thirds of the way down, at the water's edge?" "Don't know. Rock maybe. Anyway, it's not our motorboat." "No, it's not. It's worth looking into, though. Let's go." Eagerly they hurried along over the hard-packed sand. The tide was ebbing; the beach was like a floor. Their steps quickened as they approached the object. At last, less than half-conscious of what they were doing, they broke into a run. The thing they had seen was a boat. And a boat to persons in their position was a thing to be prized. Arrived at its side, they looked it over for a moment in silence. "It's pretty poor and very heavy, but it will float, I think," was Marian's first comment. "It's theirs. Thought it wasn't worth risking a stop for." "But how did they get into our camp? We haven't seen their tracks through the brush." "Probably took up one small stream and down another." The boat they had found was a wide, heavy, flat-bottomed affair, such a craft as is used by fishermen in tending pond-nets. For a time the two girls stood there undecided. The chances of their recovering the motorboat seemed very poor indeed. To go forward in this heavy boat meant hours of hand-blistering rowing to bring them back to camp. Yet the thought of returning to tell Lucile's brother that they had lost his motorboat was disheartening. To go on seemed dangerous. True, they had rifles but they were, after all, but two girls against three rough men. In spite of all this, they decided in the end to go on. Pushing the boat into the sea they rowed out a few fathoms, then set the sail and bore away before the brisk breeze. The fact that the oar-locks, which were mere wooden pegs, were worn smooth and shiny, told that the boat had not been long unused. In a short time they found themselves well out from shore in a gently rippling sea, while the point, behind which lay their camp, grew smaller and smaller in the distance. Presently they cleared a wooded point of land and came in view of a short line of beach. Deep set in a narrow bay, it might have escaped the eye of a less observant person than Marian; so, too, might the white speck that shone from the brown surface of that beach. "What's that in the center?" she mumbled, reaching for the binoculars by her side. "It's our schooner," she exclaimed after a moment's survey. "Yes, sir, it is! Anyway, it's a motor-boat, and if not ours, whose then?" "We'd better pull in behind the point, drag our boat up on the rocks and come round by land," whispered Lucile. "Yes, if we dare," said Marian, overcome for a moment with fear. "If they have seen us and come out to meet us, what then?" "I hardly think they'd see us without a field glass," said Lucile. Bending to the oars they set their boat cutting across the wavelets that increased in size with the rising wind. Ten minutes of hard pulling brought their boat in behind the point, where it was quieter water and better rowing. This took them to a position quite out of sight of the white spot on the distant beach. If the pirate robbers were truly located in the bay and had not seen the girls they were safe to steal up close. "Well, suppose they have. If the worst comes to the worst we can escape into the brush," said Marian. "We won't be worse off then than we are now." "If only we can catch them off guard and get away with our motorboat!" said Lucile fervently. Two hours of fighting the wilderness brought them at last to the beginning of the short, sandy beach. By peering through the branches they discovered that a clump of young tamaracks, growing close down to the shore, still hid the white spot they had taken for their boat. Lucile stepped out upon the sand, then bent down to examine a footprint. Quickly she dodged back into the brush. "They're here, all right," she whispered. "That's the track of the fellow with the mis-mate feet." "Listen!" said Marian. "Sounds like shouting," said Lucile, after a moment's silence. "What do you suppose?" "We'd better move around to a better position." Cautiously they worked their way through the dense undergrowth. Pausing now and again to listen, they laid their course by the sounds. These sounds resolved themselves into bursts of song and boisterous laughter. "They're drinking," said Lucile with a shudder. "If they are, we daren't get near them," whispered Marian. Closer and closer they crept until at last they expected at any moment to come into view of the camp. "It's no use," said Lucile at last, shrinking back into the brush. "I can't go on. They're drunk, and all drunken men are dangerous. It is no use risking too much for a motorboat." Wearily then they made their way back through the brush. So sore were their muscles by this time that every step gave them pain. Missing their way, they came out upon the beach a hundred yards from their boat. There, behind the sheltering boughs of a dwarf fir tree they threw themselves upon the bed of pine needles to rest. "Look!" exclaimed Lucile suddenly. "What's that out there?" "Our motorboat," Marian gasped. "It's broken loose and is going out with the tide. They must not have seen it. Quick! Our rowboat! We may beat them yet!" With wildly beating hearts they raced up the beach. Having reached the heavy rowboat they pushed it off. Wading knee-deep in the sea to give the boat a good start, they at last leaped to their seats and grasped the oars, and with strong, deft, strokes set her cutting the water. Length by length they lessened the distance between them and the drifting prize. Now they were two hundred yards away, now one hundred, now fifty, now— There came a shout from the shore. With a quick glance over her shoulder Lucile took in the situation. "We'll make it," she breathed. "Pull hard. They're a long way off." Moments seemed hours as they strained at the oars, but at last they bumped the side of the motorboat and the next second found themselves on board. Marian clung to the tiller of the rowboat while she swung round to the wheel. Lucile gave the motor a turn and to their great joy the noble little engine responded with a pop-pop-pop. There came another shout, a hopeless one, from the robbers. "We beat them. We—" Marian broke short off. "Look, Lucile. Look over there!" To the right of them, bobbing up and down as they had seen it once before, was the head of the strange brown boy. "Do you suppose they did kidnap him?" said Lucile. "We can go by where he is," said Marian. "They can't catch us now." The boat swung round and soon they were beside the swimmer. "Look," cried Lucile, "his feet are tied tightly together! He mustn't have been their friend. They carried him off. They had him bound and he rolled down to the beach to escape by swimming." They dragged the boy on board. Then they were away again, full speed once more. "Well, that's done," sighed Lucile, as she settled herself at the wheel. "They've our rowboat and we have theirs. I hope that after this they will let us alone." "The person who is bothering me," said Marian with a frown, "is this little brown visitor of ours. Who is he? Where did he come from? Where does he want to go? Where should he go? What are we going to do with him?" "That," said Lucile, wrinkling her brow, "is more than I know. Neither do I know how those men came to steal him. They probably kidnapped him from his home, wherever that is, and have been making a slave of him." "I think you are right," said Marian, "and probably the problem will solve itself in time." The problem did solve itself, at least part of it, that very night; the remaining part of the problem was to be solved months later under conditions so strange that, had the girls been able to vision them lying away, like a mirage on the horizon of the future, they would have been tempted to change their plans for the year just before them. The first question, what was to be done with the little brown stranger, was solved that night. He solved it himself. The girls had decided upon maintaining a watch. Lucile was on the second watch at something like one o'clock in the morning, when she saw the brown boy stirring in his place by the fire. She was seated far back in the shadowy depths of the tent with a rifle across her knee. He could not see her, though she could catch his every move in the moonlight. With a gliding motion he carried his two blankets to a shadowy spot and there folded each one, laying one upon the other. He then proceeded to gather up certain articles about camp. A small ax, a knife, fishing tackle and matches were hurriedly thrown upon the blanket. Now and again, like some wild thing of the forest, he paused to cock his head to one side and listen. "Should I call Marian and stop him?" Lucile asked herself. The question was left all undecided. The little drama being enacted was too fascinating to suffer interruption. It was like something that had happened in her earlier childhood when she had lain in a garret watching a mother mouse carry away her five children, Lucile thereby suffering a loss of six cents, for she would have been paid a cent apiece for the capture of those mice. The brown boy next approached the kitchen tent. He entered, to appear a moment later with a modest armload of provisions. When these had been placed on the blanket, with marvelous speed and skill he converted the whole into a convenient pack. "Shall I stop him?" Lucile asked herself. She was about to call out from her dark corner, when a peculiar action of the boy arrested her. He appeared to be taking some small object from beneath the collar of his strange suit of bird-skin. "I wonder what it is?" she puzzled. Whatever it was, he walked with it to a broad, flat rock, and placing it in the very center, turned and left it there. The object gave forth such a startling lustre in the moonlight, and Lucile was so intent upon watching it, she did not realize that the brown boy had thrown his pack over his shoulder and disappeared into the woods. When she did discover it, she merely shrugged her shoulders and smiled: "Probably for the best," she told herself. "He's taken nothing of any great value and nothing we will need badly, and, unless I miss my guess, he'll be quite able to take care of himself in a wood that is full of game and berries and where there are fish for throwing in the hook. Let's see what he left, though." Cautiously she crept out into the moonlight. A low exclamation escaped her lips as her hand closed upon the glistening object. As she examined it closely, she found it to be three teeth, apparently elk teeth. They were held together with a plain leather thong, but set in the center of each was a ring of blue jade and in the center of each of two of the rings was a large pearl. The center of the third was beyond doubt a crudely cut diamond of about two carats weight. Lucile turned it over and over in her palm. "Why, the poor fellow," she murmured. "He's given us a king's ransom for a few trinkets and a little food! And I thought he was stealing," she reproached herself. Her first instinct was to attempt to call him back. "But," she told herself, "my voice would not carry far in that dense woods. Besides, he wouldn't understand me and would only be frightened." Returning to her tent, she hid the strange bit of jewelry, which, to its wearer, had doubtless been a charm, then waited the end of her watch to tell of the strange occurrence to her cousin. When Marian awoke Lucile told her story. Together, in that early hour of the morning, they exclaimed over the rare treasure that had come into their hands; together agreed that, somehow, it must be returned to the original owner, and at last, after much talk on the subject, agreed that, on the whole, the departure of the brown boy reduced the possible complications to a considerable degree. Next day their aunt arrived and with her a school-teacher friend. With their forces increased by two the girls were not afraid to maintain their camp. In fear of the return of the robbers they established a nightly watch. That this fear was not unfounded was proved by the events of the third night of vigil. It was again in the early morning when Marian was on guard, that heavy footsteps could be heard in the underbrush about the camp. She had left the tent flap open, commanding a view of the shore line. The gasoline schooner lay high and dry on the sandy beach, within her line of vision. This she watched carefully. A man who dared touch that boat was in danger of his life, for a rifle lay across her knees and, with the native hardihood of an Alaskan, she would not fail to shoot quick and sure. But the man did not approach the boat. He merely prowled about the tents as if seeking information. Marian caught one glimpse of him over the cooking tent. Though he was gone in an instant, she recognized him as one of the men who had stolen their motorboat. After a time his footsteps sounded far down the beach. Nothing more was heard from him. "Guess he was looking for the brown boy, but became satisfied that he was not here," explained Marian next morning. "Perhaps they'll let us alone after this," said Lucile. This prophecy came to pass. After a few nights the vigil was dropped and the remaining days on the island were given over to the pleasures of camp life. The discovery of a freshly abandoned fire on the beach some miles from camp proved that Lucile's belief that the brown boy could take care of himself was well founded. His footprints were all about in the sand. Feathers of a wild duck and the heads of three good-sized fishes showed that he had fared well. "We'll meet him again somewhere, I am sure," said Lucile with conviction, "and until we do, I shall carry his little present as a sort of talisman." The weeks passed all too quickly. One day, with many regrets, they packed their camp-kit in the motorboat and went pop-popping to Lucile's home. Three weeks later saw them aboard the steamship Torentia bound for Cape Prince of Wales by way of Nome. They were entering upon a new and adventure-filled life. This journey, though they little guessed it, brought them some two thousand miles nearer the spot where, once again under the strangest of circumstances, they were to meet the brown boy who had come swimming to them from the ocean. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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