Part 37 (1/2)
”Dave seems to be gone a long time,” observed Amos Fearless, after an hour had pa.s.sed by, during which they all busied themselves in securing such pieces of the wrecked raft as came ash.o.r.e.
Suddenly Dave appeared. He was out of breath, he had been running fast.
Something of suppressed excitement in his manner showed itself plainly.
”What are you saving all that wreckage for?” he asked Bob Vilett.
”Why, to make a new raft, of course.”
”Don't waste your time,” advised Dave, with a quick, glad laugh.
”Captain, father, men, follow me! I've found the _Swallow_.”
”What!” shouted Captain Broadbeam, transfixed.
”She is anch.o.r.ed not a mile to the north. Six men left in charge of her are all stupid with drink on her deck. I crept aboard, bound them all, and the _Swallow_ is ours once more.”
CHAPTER x.x.xII
CONCLUSION
”What are the sticks for, Mr. Stoodles?” asked Dave Fearless.
”Shure, they're reed torches.”
”Oh, we have to have a light, have we?” asked Bob Vilett.
”Shure, ye have. It's simmering darkness we're going into.”
”This is the famous cave island, is it?” said Dave. ”Well, it deserves the name. Why, it's a regular honeycomb.”
”No sign of Nesik and the others yet,” said Captain Broadbeam. ”I wonder what has become of them?”
”That's aisy to surmise, captain,” declared Pat Stoodles. ”They left the fellows aboard the _Swallow_ to guzzle and get sthupid while they took a yawl and came here to remove the threasure.”
”Yes, you must remember,” said Dave, ”that their whole plan all along has been to delude their crew into the belief that the treasure went down in the _Swallow_.'”
”Wan, two, three, four, five,” spoke Stoodles, patrolling a patch of beach, and looking up and counting along the immense row of fissures and openings in the solid rock. ”The lasht one I indicate is the place we must go into.”
”You mean to say,” observed Dave, ”that the treasure is hidden in that cave.”
”Thanks to you I mane to say it, and sthick to it, too, my brave lad,”
cried Pat exuberantly.
”Thanks to me?” repeated Dave blankly.
”Begorra, yes.”
”You puzzle me, Mr. Stoodles.”