The House Boat Boys Part 10

he remarked, as he came in presently.

"What's in the wind now?" demanded Maurice, already pouring out the amber liquid into the brace of tin cups that served them just as well as the dainty aluminum ones sported by some canoeists they had once known in their Kentucky home town.

"Well, you see, our wood isn't apt to hold out all day; and besides, there's another night coming for us in this place. One of us must go ash.o.r.e later on and do some chopping."

"That'll be me, then, to start with. I'd like to get a few of the kinks out of my arms. Here, squat down, and begin work with that mess. Plenty more where that came from, and no bill to settle."

In this manner did the early morning meal progress, for the boys, having survived the perils of the night, were feeling quite like themselves again.

True to his promise, about nine o'clock as near as they could judge, Maurice climbed down into the dinghy, taking with him their only ax.

Thad had even been careful enough to fasten this with a piece of rope-end to the single thwart in the dump boat.

"If you should have a turn-over the blooming thing don't know enough to swim, like you do; and to lose it just now would put us in a fine old pickle," he explained, when Maurice joked him about the solicitude he was showing.

"That's it," remarked the occupant of the dinghy, as he balanced himself carefully in sitting down; "it might be hard to buy another ax down along here, and one as good as this daisy. Now, when I say the word, give me a dandy push, will you?"

"All right," and Thad braced himself for the exertion.

"I suppose it will be harder coming out again, with a load of wood. I'm glad you thought of that bully old scheme of dragging some of it aboard with a rope," said Maurice, taking up the paddle.

"I'll pay out the painter as you go along," remarked the one who was to remain on board the larger craft.

"Pus.h.!.+"

Having been given a fine start he plied his blade, and rapidly the little boat drew near the adjacent sh.o.r.e.

No accident befell Maurice, and he was able to land safely; after which he drew his small craft well up on the beach, before climbing the abrupt bank just beyond, by means of protruding roots of trees.

Thad listened until he heard the steady blows of the ax; and then he went back to some work he had been doing at the time.

It might have been about half an hour later that he suddenly caught what seemed to be an angry bark from the sh.o.r.e; and as the sound appeared to come directly from that quarter where he remembered Maurice had been at work, he immediately became quite concerned.

The sound came again almost immediately, and seemed even more savage than before. Following it he caught the voice of his pard raised in anger.

"Get out, you rascal! Hi! there, what d'ye mean jumping at me like that! Keep off, or I'll give you a dig with the ax. D'ye hear, you big fool?"

Apparently Maurice was in some sort of trouble, and as near as the boy on the shanty-boat could understand he had been attacked by some roving animal that had taken a fancy to try and a.s.sault the strange woodchopper.

Thad jumped into the cabin and came out with the little Marlin in his hands; but then he realized how utterly impotent he was to give his beleaguered chum a helping hand just then.

The boiling water lay between him and that sh.o.r.e for a distance of perhaps thirty feet or more; nor was it possible for even his sanguine spirit to bridge it.

True, there was the dinghy on the little beach, and the cable attached to its stern ran all the way to the larger boat, so that it was possible for him to tug away, and eventually bring it alongside.

Should he try it?

The sounds had grown even more furious, as though Maurice and the unseen dog might be engaged in something resembling a regular circus.

Suppose he pulled the dinghy away from the sh.o.r.e, and just then his chum appeared, eager to throw himself into it, his disappointment would be terrible.

But all the same Thad could not stand there helpless and listen to that terrible racket going on.

Why, for all he knew, poor old Maurice might be in hard luck, with the teeth of a savage hound threatening his very life.

And so Thad made up his mind in a hurry, for he was not the one to hesitate when an emergency called for speedy action.

He had laid the Marlin down on the deck, and applied both hands to the task of getting the small boat across that intervening stretch of water as quickly as human means could accomplish the job.

If anything was needed to urge him on to unusual haste it might have easily been found in the continual confusion of shouts, laughter, barks, and general confusion existing ash.o.r.e.

Swiftly the tender of the shanty-boat came spinning through the water, until in a short time it b.u.mped against the side.

Thad waited only long enough to deposit his precious gun in the bottom, and then crawling over the side himself, he seized upon the paddle, and dipped deeply.

No doubt he made the sh.o.r.e in much less time than it took Maurice; for there was need that he should.

The noise continued, from which Thad drew new hope; at least his beloved chum could not have been seriously injured, for just then he could almost positively declare that he heard him laugh again.

So there was a comical side to the adventure, it would seem.

Thad was in such a hurry to reach the spot that he must needs make an unfortunate miscalculation when attempting to climb up the steep bank, or else a root upon which he depended proved false to his trust.

However that might be the boy fell back again, landing in a heap at the base of the little bluff.

Taking warning from his mishap that speed is not always an indication of ultimate success, Thad became a little more careful; and as a consequence he soon had the satisfaction of finding himself on the top of the river bank.

Here Maurice had piled quite some wood, which doubtless he calculated fastening to the spare rope, so that it could be dragged aboard once he had joined his chum.

Smaller stuff he would stow away in the tender, and thus avoid getting the same wet.

But Thad was not bothering his head about the wood just then; he could still hear the barking, and the voice of his friend not far away, accompanied by various mysterious sounds that seemed to resemble the dropping of a heavy body on the ground.

So he gripped the gun and began to move forward, steeling his nerves for any sort of surprise possible.

In this fas.h.i.+on he presently reached what seemed to be a little glade, where at some time in the dim past the trees had gone down, either in a hurricane or before a settler's ax.

Then the show was before him!

His attention was immediately attracted to a moving object that continued to leap upward with wriggling movements, and then fall back again to the ground, to obtain new footing and try again.

And each attempt was being greeted by disdainful remarks from Maurice, who could be seen dangling his legs some seven feet or so up in a friendly tree.

Thad breathed freer.

He knew now that his chum had been wise enough to take refuge among the branches of this tree when he lost hold of the ax with which he had been defending himself.

And since he seemed so very merry now, it was evident that he had not been badly injured by the teeth of the brute.