Dave Fearless and the Cave of Mystery: or, Adrift on the Pacific

CHAPTER XXX
DISASTER

It would be impossible to do full justice to the joy and excitement occasioned by the return of Dave Fearless to the Swallow.

Dave had come up to the steamer unperceived. He knew how to get to the old familiar deck without being discovered.

His first rush was for the dear old father, seated on a stool watching the cheerful scene ashore, but all the time thinking of his missing son.

There was an affectionate greeting between these two who thought so much of one another. Then Captain Broadbeam nearly wrung Dave's hand lame, trying to express his delight at seeing him once more safe and sound aboard the Swallow.

"Mr. Stoodles away-and Bob, too?" exclaimed Dave disappointedly, a little later, as he was told of the happenings with his friends since he had last seen them. "That is unfortunate. I hope they will soon return safely. In fact, it is almost indispensable that Mr. Stoodles see the poor native I brought aboard with me."

"He'll have to see him soon, then," said Doctor Barrell, shaking his head seriously. "The man is in pretty bad condition, Dave. I doubt if I can pull him through."

"He is the possessor of a great secret," said Dave. "Let me tell you about it."

"I hope Stoodles comes back in time to talk with the outcast," said Amos Fearless anxiously, after Dave had told his story.

The next morning there was some disturbing news to report by the boatswain. Gerstein had escaped during the night, taking the best equipped of the small yawls with him.

Then there were two days of solicitous nursing of the outcast and anxious waiting for the return of Stoodles and Bob.

One morning a loud cheer brought the coterie at the captain's table in great haste and excitement on deck.

Stoodles and Bob had arrived by the overland route.

There was a vast babel of talk and welcome lasting over an hour, while all matters were mutually explained.

"I'm so solid with the present government of the Windjammers," boasted Pat proudly, "that I could command legions and phalanxes at my instant beck and call."

"That is good, Mr. Stoodles," smiled Dave. "So you had them out looking everywhere for me, did you?"

"Yes, and I promised them that a fearful visitation of fire-some of Bob's foine fireworks-would disrupt the nation if within three days you were not found."

"Well, Stoodles," said Captain Broadbeam, "we may need the help of the natives when we get farther along. For the present, however, there is only one thing to do. Get into shape to go for that treasure. The Swallow is all fixed up. We are in perfect sailing trim. We know that Nesik and his crowd are still alive, but we need have no fear of them without a ship to harbor them. Another thing-Gerstein's escape is unfortunate. He may get to his friends and warn them. In the morning we will start to hunt up the treasure."

"Gerstein may get there first," suggested Dave.

"Suppose he does. He's got no ship to carry the treasure away in. I see possible fighting ahead if we run across Nesik and the Hankers, but we've got the upper hand of them. Dave, lad, take Stoodles down to see the native you brought here. Try to find out something definite about the hiding-place of the treasure, will you, Pat?"

"Shure, I will," declared Stoodles.

"Oh, the man will tell you freely-I know it from his gestures to me!" declared Dave. "He was very low last night, though. Come, Mr. Stoodles, I will take you to him, let him know that you are my friend, and the rest will be easy."

They went to the forecastle. The boatswain met them at the door of the little compartment that marked the hospital of the ship.

"Mr. Stoodles is to see the sick native, Mr. Drake," said Dave.

The boatswain looked very somber.

"Mr. Stoodles is too late," he pronounced solemnly.

"Too late?" echoed Dave.

"Yes; the poor fellow died an hour ago."

Dave went back to the cabin with the sad news. Stoodles expressed a curiosity to see the outcast, and the boatswain accompanied him to the hospital.

When later Dave looked for Pat, the Milesian sent word by the boatswain that he was very busy and would see his friend in the morning.

It was about two hours after midnight that Dave awoke with a great start. As he sprang to the floor from his berth Bob Vilett dashed into the stateroom.

"Dave, Dave!" he cried. "It's all up with us."

"Now what-" began Dave. He was interrupted by great tramping on the deck and the sound of pistol-shots.

Dave hurried on his clothes and rushed after Bob to the deck.

A blow from a marlinspike sent Bob flat and a rough stranger grabbed Dave as he appeared.

Captain Broadbeam and his crew were hemmed in near the bow, held at bay by a dozen armed men.

With a sinking heart Dave realized what had happened-the brave little Swallow was in the hands of their enemies: Captain Nesik of the Raven, the Hankers, and all that rascally crew.

CHAPTER XXXI
A LUCKY FIND

"Land ahead!" sang out Captain Broadbeam's terrific voice in foghorn bass.

"We'll never reach it," declared Bob Vilett.

"Begorra, this is the worst yet," observed Pat Stoodles.

"Steady; be ready to jump if the raft tips," said Dave Fearless.

Fog, blackness, rain, and tempest surrounded the crew of the Swallow. A critical moment, indeed, had arrived in their experiences.

The capture of the Swallow early that morning had been effected by their enemies within an hour. The attack had been a vast surprise. No one had anticipated it, no one was prepared to meet it.

Superior numbers, desperate men heavily armed, had simply overpowered those on board of the steamer two at a time.

The bound captives were put ashore. With sad hearts they saw the Swallow sail out of the secret cove in the hands of their enemies. Dave's hardest trial was to listen to the triumphant taunts of Bart Hankers. The elder Hankers gloated over Amos Fearless.

Captain Nesik goaded Captain Broadbeam to the verge of madness with his mean sneers.

Then they steamed away, the captives got loose from their bonds, and there they were, faced with the very worst fortune, it seemed, where a few hours previous good luck only had smiled on them.

"I've an idea," said Pat Stoodles at once.

"Well, what is it?" asked Broadbeam.

"Put afther the rascals."

"Of course we will do that," said the captain, "and mighty smart, too. Don't give up, lads," he cried encouragingly to those around him. "We've the will, we'll find a way. Something tells me those thieving buccaneers haven't the intelligence or grit to hold a good point when they make it."

"Captain," said Stoodles, with a sudden air of importance, "if you will all come to the native village with me, I'll bargain to have you conveyed where you like in all the royal canoes of the tribe."

"It would take too much time-it might complicate matters. The sight of so many of us might change the ideas of the natives as to a friendly welcome," said Broadbeam.

"Why not make a raft, then?" suggested Doctor Barrell.

"Where to go?" asked Bob Vilett, who was quite dejected over the bad turn in affairs.

"In search of the threasure, shure," said Pat.

"We don't know where it is," said Bob. "We might search for forty years and not find a trace of the treasure."

"Not at all," put in Dave sharply. "Find an island full of caves, and we have the location. I am sure of that from what the outcast native imparted to me."

"And I," announced Pat Stoodles suddenly. "Begorra, I'm the lad who can put my finger right on the one particular cave where the threasure is stored."

All hands looked at Stoodles in a sort of dubious amazement.

"Is that true, Mr. Stoodles?" asked Doctor Barrell.

"Shure it is."

"How can you know that?" inquired Dave.

"The outcast tould me."

"Told you. Why, he was dead when you saw him," said Dave.

"The outcast tould me," reiterated Pat solemnly. "Not another wurred now. I am spaking from facts. Get afloat, make for the lasht of the three western islands. Land me. I'll take you to the threasure blindfold."

They set to work at once to make a raft. This was not difficult, for plenty of excellent material was at hand. It was late afternoon when they got afloat. At ten o'clock that evening, caught in a terrible storm, the appearance of breakers denoted the nearness of land.

"Jump for your lives!" suddenly rang out the voice of Captain Broadbeam.

The raft had struck an immense rock and was splintered to pieces by the contact. Now it was a wild swim for shore in the boiling surf.

Captain Broadbeam anxiously and eagerly counted his men a few minutes later as they ranged on the beach.

"None lost," he announced gladly. "Where are we, Stoodles?"

"I can't exactly tell, your honor, but I should say on the second western island. I'll take a short trip and report, sir."

Stoodles strolled away in one direction; Dave, ever active, went in another.

In half an hour Stoodles was back to the little group of refugees with the statement that they were on the second west island, as he had guessed before.

"Dave seems to be gone a long time," observed Amos Fearless, after an hour had passed by, during which they all busied themselves in securing such pieces of the wrecked raft as came ashore.

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 anchored 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 XXXII
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."

"Arrah, then, out with it: The outcast was dead when I saw him, but I happened to notice that his back was tattooed. It took me eight hours to make out the marks. I can spake the native dialect well enough, but the script was hard to figure out. But I did it."

"And what did it tell?" asked Dave interestedly.

"Well, two outcasts had found the gold. So as not to forget exactly where it was, one tattooed a diagram or chart, or whatever you may call it, on the back of the other. One of them died a little later. That's all, come on."

The wonders of the next two hours, those who followed the guidance of Pat Stoodles never forgot. It was like a visit to fairy-land. They penetrated underground chambers of dazzling magnificence, the torches illuminating walls and roofs of glittering splendor.

At last, in a depression of a great rock-crystal stone, they came across a heap of straw.

Pulling it aside, a golden gleam dazzled the eager eyes of the onlookers.

"It's there! Oh, it's there!" cried the enraptured Dave Fearless.

The ocean treasure, again recovered, lay before them.

It had come so easily, so naturally, that there was something unreal about the whole thing.

The moment could not help but be filled with the intensest joy and excitement. Yet in a plain, practical, business way they went to work to encase the great mountain of loose golden coins in sacks which they had brought with them.

It was nightfall when they had got the golden hoard all on board of the Swallow, and safely stored in the hold of the stanch little steamer that had carried them through so many adventures and perils in safety up to this supreme moment of their lives.

What of Nesik and his cohorts? Fifty times during the evening this theme was earnestly discussed.

Dave Fearless sat thinking over this and many other things late that night, enjoying the cool, refreshing breeze as he lay comfortably in a hammock.

Suddenly he jumped upright with a shock. A form dripping with water clambered into view. He landed on the deck, staring wildly about him.

"Someone, quick!" he gasped. "I'm done out. Quick, Fearless! Start the steamer, quick! Danger-explosion!"

"Daley!" shouted Dave. And then, as the man fell like a clod at his feet, he ran right down into the engine room.

Something told Dave that this man was giving an important friendly warning.

He fairly pulled Bob Adams from his bunk. He ordered him to start the engines at once. He ran to the cabin and roused Captain Broadbeam.

"What's this-the steamer going?" cried Broadbeam.

"Yes, something is wrong," gasped Dave. "Come on deck-the mischief!"

A frightful roar rent the air. The whole ship shivered. Just behind him as he came up on deck Dave saw a mighty flare, a great lifting of the waters. Then all was still.

It was not until the following morning, when Daley recovered consciousness, that they knew the terrible peril they had escaped through his friendly intervention.

It seemed that he had managed to get to the second west island. He was nearly starved when he ran across Nesik and the others.

He decided it was politic to make friends with them. The night previous he was the only trusted one of the crew that Nesik and the Hankers took in the yawl that went for the treasure.

"They got the gold," narrated Daley.

"Oh, they did?" muttered Captain Broadbeam, with a jolly smile.

"I helped them-in bags just as Gerstein had left it."

"Smart boy, that same Gerstein!" chuckled Pat Stoodles.

"Then they discovered that you people had recaptured the Swallow," continued Daley. "All day they hid with the yawl in a little cave. They decided you people would be too watchful to ever afford them a chance to again get possession of the steamer. You certainly would try to find them. Gerstein submitted a diabolical plan. They had some dynamite used in clearing away a stopped-up passageway in the cave. They made up a float, fused the dynamite, and with a cord guided it down the beach towards you. I got away from them."

"And warned us in time, brave mate!" cried Captain Broadbeam, heartily grasping the sailor's hand. "We're your friends for life."

The Swallow did not leave the Windjammers' Island for a week. During that time Stoodles made several visits to the natives. On one of these he and Dave took with them the two boxes Dave had purchased at Minotaur Island.

They returned feeling pretty good over something accomplished, and refused to discuss it with the intensely curious Bob Vilett.

Jones and Lewis were found and taken aboard of the Swallow, which started homeward-bound at last.

At Mercury Island their prisoners from the Raven were set ashore. Of Captain Nesik, the Hankers, and the others not a trace had been found.

Dave and his friends well knew that a terrible disappointment had faced the plotters when they came to discover that the bags they had secured in one of the caves did not contain the gold.

The native outcasts they were certain had removed the gold to the place where they found it, filling the bags with something heavy and replacing these at the original hiding-place.

Amos Fearless gave his friends a royal banquet the day the Swallow arrived at San Francisco.

Each one, down to the humblest sailor, received a generous share of the ocean treasure they had suffered so much to secure.

The rest of the gold was shipped by rail to Quanatack, and Doctor Barren's curiosities to the Government at Washington.

Captain Broadbeam, Doctor Barrell, Pat Stoodles, and Bob Vilett were special guests of Dave and his father in the new beautiful home they bought on Long Island Sound.

"Dave, when are you ever going to tell us that secret of yours and Stoodles' about those two boxes you took from Minotaur Island?" asked Bob one evening, as they all sat on the broad veranda of the Fearless home, enjoying the lovely evening.

"Oh, that is only a side issue now," smiled Dave, "seeing we got the treasure."

"A great scheme, though," said Stoodles. "I'll tell it. Dave simply got the royal sanction at the Windjammers' Island to establish a postal service. We did it up officially before the whole tribe. We printed ten thousand postage stamps."

"And as we control the whole issue," said Dave, "of course we can charge our own price for them as rarities."

The old ocean diver and his son were sorry when their loyal friends had to leave them for the duties of life that called them to business.

They saw much of one another, however, from time to time. Each was splendidly provided for out of the ocean treasure. Good fortune did not spoil any of them, and each settled down to a practical, useful, and happy life.

THE END