Keeping His Course E-Book

Ralph Henry Barbour

• Herausgeber: Librorium Editions
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

A boy with light blue eyes that just about matched the slightly hazy June sky sat on the float below the town landing at Greenhaven, L. I., and stared thoughtfully across harbor and bay to where, two miles northward, the village of Johnstown stretched along the farther shore. He had a round, healthy, and deeply tanned face of which a short nose, many freckles, the aforementioned blue eyes, and a somewhat square chin were prominent features. There was, of course, a mouth, as well, and that, too, was prominent just now, for it was puckered with the little tune that the boy was softly whistling. Under a sailor’s hat of white canvas the hair was brown, but a brown that only escaped being red by the narrowest of margins. That fact was a sore subject with Toby Tucker.

Leseprobe

KEEPING HIS COURSE

BY

RALPH HENRY BARBOUR

1918

© 2022 Librorium Editions

ISBN : 9782383836216

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

I.

Toby Resents an Insult

II.

TheTurnover

III.

Arnold Pays His Debts

IV.

Friends Afloat

V.

Shots in the Dark

VI.

Pursuit and Capture

VII.

The Stolen Launch

VIII.

The Hidden Name

IX.

“Three Hundred Dollars Reward!”

X.

Toby Blocks the Plate

XI.

Toby Makes Up His Mind

XII.

“T. Tucker, Prop.”

XIII.

Trick for Trick

XIV.

Toby Is Downhearted

XV.

Phebe Christens the Knockabout

XVI.

Lost in the Fog

XVII.

The Lighted Window

XVIII.

Mr. Tucker Consents

XIX.

Toby Accepts a Challenge

XX.

A Close Call

XXI.

The Distress Signal

261

XXII.

Into Port

KEEPING HIS COURSE

CHAPTER ITOBY RESENTS AN INSULT

A

boy with light blue eyes that just about matched the slightly hazy June sky sat on the float below the town landing at Greenhaven, L. I., and stared thoughtfully across harbor and bay to where, two miles northward, the village of Johnstown stretched along the farther shore. He had a round, healthy, and deeply tanned face of which a short nose, many freckles, the aforementioned blue eyes, and a somewhat square chin were prominent features. There was, of course, a mouth, as well, and that, too, was prominent just now, for it was puckered with the little tune that the boy was softly whistling. Under a sailor’s hat of white canvas the hair was brown, but a brown that only escaped being red by the narrowest of margins. That fact was a sore subject with Toby Tucker.

Perhaps had his hair been really and truly red, beyond all question, he wouldn’t have minded being called “Ginger” and “Carrots” and “Sorrel Top” and “Red Head” and all the other names frequently—but usually from a safe distance—bestowed on him. Perhaps it was the injustice of it that hurt. That as may be, a hint that Toby’s hair was red—or even reddish—was equivalent to a declaration of war, and entailed similar consequences! He wore, besides the duck hat, a sailor’s jacket of like material, a pair of khaki trousers, and brown canvas “sneakers.” You wouldn’t have called him “smartly dressed,” perhaps, but what he wore seemed to suit him and was, at least, clean.

From where he sat, perched on a box labeled “Sunny South Brand Tomatoes,” he had a clear view of Spanish Harbor, and beyond its mouth a wide expanse of Great Peconic Bay. Beyond that again lay the green fields and low, wooded hills of the north shore. A coal barge, which had lately discharged her cargo at Rollinson’s Wharf, was anchored in the middle channel, awaiting a tug. Nearer at hand were a half-dozen pleasure sailboats, a blunt-nosed, drab-hued fishing sloop, and a black launch, all tugging gently at their moorings on the incoming tide. On either side of the float a little company of rowboats and small launches rubbed sides. Behind him, the rusted iron wheels of the gangplank, leading to the wharf above, creaked as the float swung to the rising water.

Toby had the landing to himself. The box on which he sat held provisions for the yacht Penguin, and some time around nine o’clock a tender was to call for them. Toby, when school wasn’t in session, did such odd jobs as fell to his hand, and just now, it being Saturday morning, he was earning a whole quarter of a dollar from Perkins & Howe, the grocers. Having propelled the box to the gangplank in a wheelbarrow, and slid it down to its present resting place, all that remained was to continue sitting right there until some one claimed it, a task which suited Toby perfectly.

Not that he was especially lazy or disliked work, for he wasn’t and didn’t, but it was pleasantly hot today, and Toby was in a contemplative frame of mind, and sitting there in the sun, with the water lapping beneath him and the good smell of the sea in his nostrils, was very satisfying to Toby’s soul. The visions he saw with those blue eyes of his, squinted a bit because of the glare on the dancing water, must have been enthralling, since he didn’t observe the white launch that entered the harbor until it was almost up to the landing.

Then the chug-chug of her exhaust caught his attention, and he shaded his eyes and observed her intently. She wasn’t very big, perhaps eighteen feet over all, and she had a spray hood in lieu of cabin. At present the hood was down, and Toby could see much mahogany and polished brass as the launch sped, head on, for the landing. There was only one passenger in sight, a boy of about Toby’s age, who stood at the wheel in the bow. Toby, who knew most of the craft that entered Spanish Harbor, failed to recognize this one. Nor did the name, in gilt letters on her nose, make him any wiser.

“Frolic,” muttered Toby. “Never heard of her before. Must be a new one. Wonder where that lubber thinks he’s going to? He’ll be on the float in a minute if he doesn’t look out!”

When about forty feet away the boy in the launch threw the clutch into reverse. There was much churning of green water under the stern, and the boat’s speed lessened, but what with the impetus given her and the incoming tide she seemed bound to either land high and dry on the float or to considerably damage her immaculate white and gold bow. The skipper dropped the wheel and looked excitedly around for a boat-hook.

“Sheer off, you idiot!” cried Toby, nimbly scrambling out of the way. “Put your wheel over!”

“Grab her!” responded the boy in the launch. “Fend her off!”

Toby grunted. Then there was a crash, the float bobbed and shivered, and the white launch, finding further progress barred, rebounded from the obstacle in her path, and, leaving much fresh white paint on the canvas fender, churned merrily backward. Simultaneously two boys, one on the float and one in the launch, scrambled to their feet again and broke into speech.

“Hey, you boob!” yelled Toby. “Look where you’re going! You’ll have her stern into that dory in a minute. Shut off your engine!”

“Why didn’t you grab her?” demanded the boy in the launch angrily. “Couldn’t you see she was going to hit?”

“I’d look nice trying to stop her, wouldn’t I?” countered Toby contemptuously. “Why don’t you learn to run a launch before you come around here destroying property? What were you trying to do, anyhow? Climb the gangplank in her?”

“I couldn’t come in any way but straight on, could I? Look at all those boats along the sides! Why don’t they give a fellow a chance to get up here?”

“Well, you’re not expected to make your landing at sixty miles an hour, you silly lubber. Here, hold that out and I’ll pull you in.”

Somewhat disgruntled, the amateur navigator proffered the end of the boat-hook and in a jiffy the Frolic was alongside. Toby returned to his seat on the box and watched the other make fast. Conscious of Toby’s ironical regard, the skipper of the Frolic was flustered and awkward, and twice got the line tangled around his feet. When he stood up from his task, he was red of face and out of temper. “That suit your highness?” he inquired.

Toby grinned. “Well, it ain’t customary in these parts to make a boat fast with a square knot, but I guess she’ll hold.”

“You think you’re smart, don’t you?” sneered the other.

Toby made no reply to that, merely smiling in a most exasperating manner. Presently, when the skipper of the Frolic had laboriously shoved the launch out of the way, he looked questioningly about the landing.

“Where can I get gasoline?” he asked more affably.

Toby was maddeningly deliberate. “Gasoline?”

“Yes.”

“How much do you want?”

“What’s that got to do with it?” demanded the other impatiently.

“Well, if you want as much as ten gallons it would pay me to get it for you.”

“I can get it myself if you’ll tell me where they keep it. Don’t they have it here at this landing? Isn’t this the town landing?”

“Yes.” Toby looked around the float. “I don’t see any gasoline, though; do you?”

“Well, then, where——”

“You can get all you want at Tucker’s wharf over there.”

The other followed the direction of Toby’s pointing finger. “At the boat yard you mean?”

Toby nodded. “Yes; just chug over there to the float where you see the red tank.”

“Why couldn’t you tell me that before I tied up?”

“You didn’t ask me.” The other grunted and set about casting off again, during which operation Toby studied him speculatively.

He saw a boy of perhaps a year his senior, and Toby was fifteen, fairly tall, slim, and undeniably good looking. He had brown eyes and brown hair, the latter slicked back in a way that was strange and awe-inspiring to the observer, and his face, with its straight nose and somewhat pointed chin, lacked the healthy coat of tan that Toby’s possessed. Yes, he was a good looking chap, Toby decided, but a most unpleasant and unlikable one. That fact, however, was not going to prevent Toby from making a sale, and when the visitor had sprung aboard, Toby glanced doubtfully at his box of groceries, swept the harbor without seeing anything that looked like the tender from the Penguin, and jumped lightly to the Frolic.

“I’ll go over with you and get it,” he said. “Where’s your boat-hook? All right. Start her up!”

The other viewed him doubtfully. “What have you got to do with it?” he asked, suspiciously.

“That’s my father’s wharf, and he’s busy up in the shed. If it’s gasoline you want, I’m your man. Take her across easy now.”

The engine started at half-speed, and the Frolic slid quietly away from the town landing, past the end of the coal wharf, and across the Cove to the boat-yard landing. This time the launch’s operator performed his task more creditably and nestled up against the small float with no more damage to her paint. While he made her fast Toby sprang out and ran up the gangplank to the big red tank at the end of the wharf.

“How much do you want?” he called back.

“About nine, I guess. My tank holds ten, and I think there’s almost a gallon in it.”

“All right.” Toby held a five-gallon can under the faucet and when it was full climbed down again and swung it to the bow of the launch. “Look out for the paint,” requested the other boy. “Wait till I get the funnel. Go ahead now.”

Toby poured the contents of the can into the tank and returned again to the wharf. When the final four gallons had been added he set the can back on the float and observed: “One ninety-eight, please.”

“One ninety—— Say, how much do you charge a gallon?” exclaimed the other, incredulously.

“Twenty-two cents. This is the best there is.”

“Twenty-two! Why, I only paid twenty in New York the other day!”

“You were lucky,” drawled Toby. “It’s twenty-two here. What you got was low-grade, I guess.”

“Well, I don’t intend to pay any twenty-two cents. I’ll pay just what I paid in New York. Here’s two dollars, and I want twenty cents change.”

Toby, hands in pockets, paid no heed to the proffered bill. Instead he looked speculatively at the little round hole through which the gasoline had disappeared. “It’s going to be hard to get it out of there,” he mused. “Maybe we can do it with a pump, though.”

“Get it out? What for? Look here, twenty cents is enough and——”

“Not when the price is twenty-two,” replied Toby decidedly. “We charge the same as everywhere else here. You’d have paid twenty-two at the town landing just the same.”

“At the town landing! You said they didn’t keep it there!”

“No, sir, I didn’t. I said I didn’t see any.” Toby grinned. “And I didn’t, either. You can’t, from the float.”

“You’re a smart guy, aren’t you?” said the other angrily. “You make me come away over here and then try to hold me up! Well, you can’t do it! You fork over twenty cents and you’ll get this two dollars, you—you red-headed cheat!”

Toby’s grin faded instantly. “What did you call me?” he asked very quietly after a moment’s silence.

“You heard it! Now you find twenty cents and——”

They were standing on the canvas-covered deck at the bow, a precarious place at the best, with the launch rolling a bit, and not at all the sort of place the Frolic’s skipper would have selected for battle had he been allowed a choice. But he wasn’t, for his naughty remarks were rudely interrupted, rudely and unexpectedly! With something between a grunt and a snarl, Toby threw himself upon him.

“Take it back!” he panted. “’Tain’t red, and you know it!”

The older boy gave way before the sudden assault, tried to wrest his arms free from Toby’s grip, failed at that, and, bringing his greater weight to bear, forced the other back across the tiny decking. They struggled and panted, only the rubber soles they wore keeping them from going overboard.

“Let me alone, you silly ass!” grunted the older youth. “We’ll both be in the water in a second.”

“Take it back, then!” panted Toby. “’Tain’t red, is it?”

“Yes, it is! It’s red as—as fire!” He wrenched an arm free and struck out angrily. The blow missed, and Toby caught at the arm, trying now to trip his opponent up. But the law of gravity cannot be trifled with forever, and what was bound to happen sooner or later happened right then. Toby’s leg worked behind the other; he bore back and—over they went, still tightly clasped together, with a splash that awoke the echoes of the Cove!

CHAPTER IITHETurnover

T

hey came up separately, Toby first. Fortunately for the boy of the launch, a good eight feet separated him from Toby at the moment of his emergence, for Toby was by no means satisfied and proved it by an earnest endeavor to reach his adversary before the latter could splash and flounder his way around the bow of the launch and throw himself, breathless and half-drowned, across the edge of the float. From that position he squirmed not an instant too soon and half-leaped and half-fell across the gunwale of the launch and seized the boat-hook.

“Now, you wild idiot,” he gasped, “you keep away from me!”

Toby viewed the situation, pulled himself to the float and grinned. “All right,” he said. “You got the best of it now, but it ain’t red, and I’ll make you say so sooner or later. Now you pay what you owe me.”

An expression of blank dismay came to the other’s face, and he gazed anxiously about deck and water. “I dropped it! You made me do it, too! Now you find it!”

Toby shrugged. “I guess it’s at the bottom now. Let me look.”

“You stay where you are,” commanded the other, threatening again with his weapon.

“I won’t do anything—honest,” assured Toby. “Not now, that is. Put that thing down and let me see if I can see your money.”

In a moment the two were leaning over the side of the launch and peering into the water. But the surface was ruffled and it was impossible to see much below it. “When did you let go of it?” inquired Toby.

“How do I know? When you grabbed me, I suppose.”

“Haven’t you got any more money with you?”

“No, I haven’t, and if I had I wouldn’t give it to you,” was the ungracious reply. Toby considered. Finally:

“Well, I’ll take half the blame,” he decided, “but that’s all. You pay me ninety-nine cents and we’ll call it square.”

“That’s twenty-two cents a gallon, though.”

Toby nodded. “Sure. That’s the price.”

After a moment’s consideration the other consented. “But you’ll have to trust me for it,” he said. “That two dollars was all I had.”

“All right. What’s your name?”

“Deering, Arnold Deering. I live on the Head.”

“Spanish Head? Whose house have you got?”

“We live in our own house. It’s called ‘Cedarcroft,’ and it’s the big one right at the end——”

“Oh, the new one that was built last winter? All right. Arnold Deering, eh? I’ll remember. You’re the fellow who owes me ninety-nine cents—and an apology.”

“You’ll get the ninety-nine cents, all right; I’ll bring it over tomorrow. But you’ll have to whistle for any apology from me!”

“I can whistle,” answered Toby undisturbedly.

“You’ll have to!” Arnold was having difficulty with the knot he had tied. Toby looked on quizzically.

“Those square knots——” he began.

“Oh, shut up!” Arnold finally cast loose and climbed aboard. “You get off now.”

“I was thinking maybe you’d drop me at the town landing,” replied Toby calmly. “I’ve got a box of groceries over there.”

“Well, all right, but you’ll have to jump. I don’t intend to stop for you.”

“Sure. Reverse her when you start and back out. Put your wheel hard over and——”

“Say,” inquired Arnold belligerently, “who’s running this thing?”

“You are. How long have you had her?”

“About a week.”

“She’s a nice boat. If I was you I’d learn to run her. Don’t do a boat any good to ram her into things.”

“Is that so? I’ll bet I can run a launch as well as you can, you——”

“Careful!” warned Toby.

“You fresh kid!”

“All right. Look out for the coal wharf. Mr. Rollinson would be awfully mad if you carried away the end of it! Just slow her up and I’ll jump for it.”

“I hope you fall in,” said the other vindictively. Toby laughed.

“I wouldn’t be much wetter if I did! All right now. Thanks!” He made a flying leap over the four feet of water between launch and float and landed safely. Simultaneously Arnold twirled the wheel and the Frolic pointed her nose down the harbor and chugged indignantly away. Not, however, until Toby had sent a gentle reminder floating after her.

“Frolic, ahoy!” he shouted.

Arnold turned an inquiring head.

“Don’t forget that ninety-nine cents! And remember I’m still whistling!”

There was no reply, and Toby, seating himself on the box, chuckled wickedly and resumed his onerous task.

Toby’s father wasn’t nearly as amused as Toby had expected him to be when he was told the incident of the last two-dollar bill at dinner that day. Mr. Tucker was a tall, stooped man of forty-odd years, with faded blue eyes in a weather-tanned face. The Tuckers had been boat builders for three generations, and Mr. Aaron Tucker’s skin seemed to have borrowed the hue from the mahogany that for so many years past had been sawed and shaped and planed and sandpapered in the big shed across the harbor road. In the old days Tucker’s Boat Yard had turned out good-sized fishing and pleasure craft, but business had fallen away in the last dozen years, and now small launches and sloops and rowboats constituted the output. And, at that, business was far from brisk. Perhaps Mr. Tucker had the fact in mind when he inquired dryly who was to pay for that other four and a half gallons of gasoline.

“I guess I’ll have to,” said Toby, ruefully.

“I calculate you will,” agreed his father.

“At the wholesale price, though,” added the boy hastily; and Mr. Tucker’s eyes twinkled as he nodded.

But if the story won small appreciation from his father, there was one, at least, at the dinner table who enjoyed it, and that was Toby’s sister, Phebe. Phebe Tucker was thirteen, a slim, pretty girl with hair that Toby called “yaller” and Phebe’s mother termed golden. She had very bright, brown eyes under long lashes and a skin that, even though nearly as brown as Toby’s, was clear and smooth. There were no other children and so Toby and his sister had always been very close companions, a fact which probably accounted for a somewhat boyish quality in Phebe. She could sail a boat nearly as well as Toby, catch quite as many fish, was no mean hand at the oars, and could perform almost as many “stunts” in the water as he could. She asked no favors and was always ready for adventure—a jolly, companionable girl with a wealth of spirits, and good nature and good health.

Neither of the children resembled their mother in looks, for Mrs. Tucker was small, with dark hair and eyes, and comfortably stout. Her children called her “roly-poly,” a descriptive term which Mrs. Tucker pretended to resent. For the rest, she was a quiet, kind-hearted little woman, who worshiped her big husband and her children, and whose main ambition was to see that they were happy.

Saturday afternoon was always a holiday for Toby and Phebe, and after dinner was over they went out to the front steps and pondered what to do. The cottage was a neat, white-clapboarded little house, perched on a slope above the harbor road. From the gate a flight of six wooden steps led to a tiny bricked walk which ran the length of the cottage.

A wistaria vine, venerable with age, was in full bloom at one side of the doorway, while between house and walk narrow beds held a wealth of old-fashioned flowers. From the steps one looked across the cobbled, winding harbor road, tree-shaded in summer, to the boat yard with its weather-beaten shed and its old stone wharf, and beyond that to the little harbor and to the nestling village houses on the other side.

“We might go out in the launch,” suggested Toby, “only I’d have to fix the wiring first.”

“Would it take long?” asked his sister.

“I guess not. I couldn’t find the trouble yesterday, though. We might take a run around to Shinnecock if I can get her started.”

“Let’s,” said Phebe. “It’s too beautiful a day to stay ashore. You go ahead and see if you can’t fix it and I’ll be right along.”

So Toby crossed the road, passed around the further side of the big shed, from which came the tap-tap of hammers and the buzz of the bandsaw, climbed down a slippery ladder and dropped into the launch.

Toby had made most of that boat himself. It wasn’t as grand as the Frolic and it boasted little bright work and no gilt. But, in spite of its name, it was at once safe, roomy and fast. Its name—you had to look on the stern to find it—was Turnover. In lowering the engine into it the summer before Toby’s assistant had lost control of the rope, with the result that the engine, at that instant poised over the gunwale, had descended very hurriedly. The boat, probably resenting the indignity, had promptly turned its keel to the sky and dumped the engine to the bottom of the slip in six feet of water. The boat hadn’t actually turned over, for having got rid of the engine and shipped a good deal of water it had righted itself very nicely, but Toby had dubbed it Turnover there and then.

The Turnover was sixteen feet long, with a four-and-a-half-foot beam, had a two-cylinder engine—purchased second-hand but really as good as new—capable of sending the launch through the water at a good twelve-mile gait, and was painted a rather depressing shade of gray. Toby favored that color not so much for its attractiveness as because it didn’t show dirt, and it must be owned that the Turnover was seldom immaculate, inside or out. But she suited Toby down to the ground—or perhaps I should say down to the water—and I doubt if any one else could have made her go as he did. The Turnover had her own eccentricities and it was necessary to humor her.

Toby began operations by pushing his duck hat to the back of his head and reflectively scratching the front of it, a trick caught from his father. Then, having decided on a plan of action, he set to work. Before he had discovered the trouble and remedied it, with the aid of an odd bit of insulated copper wire pulled from a locker, Phebe was swinging her feet from the edge of the wharf and watching. Experience had taught her the advisability of keeping out of the way until the work was done. At last, wiping a perspiring face in a bunch of greasy waste, Toby threw the switch on and turned the fly-wheel over.

A heartening chug-chug rewarded him, and, tossing the tools back in the locker, he unscrewed the cap of the gasoline tank, plunged a stick into it, examined the result, did some mental calculation, and at last declared himself ready to start. Phebe lowered herself nimbly down the ladder and seated herself at the wheel while Toby cast off the lines from the bow and stern. The Turnover backed out of the little slip rather noisily, swung her pert nose toward the harbor mouth, and presently was sliding past the moored craft at a fine clip. Once around the point the breeze met them and the Turnover began to nod to the quartering waves. Toby slathered oil here and there, gave her more gas, and seated himself across from his sister.

“She’s going fine,” he said. “I guess we could make Robins Island if we wanted to.”

“That’s too far, Toby. I’d rather go to Shinnecock.”

“All right. It’s going to be dandy after we get around the Head. There’s a peach of a swell, isn’t there?”

The launch dipped her way past Nobbs Island, with its squatty lighthouse, and Phebe turned the launch toward the Head.

“There’s the place that fellow lives,” said Toby, nodding at a fine new stone-and-shingle house on the point. “The fellow I had the scrap with, I mean.”

“It’s a lovely house,” said Phebe. “I suppose they have lots of money, don’t you?”

“Slathers, I guess. He’s a pill. Can’t run that launch any more than Mr. Murphy can.” (Mr. Murphy was Phebe’s parrot, and, while he had been through some nautical experiences, he was naturally no navigator!) “He didn’t do a thing to her paint when he bumped into the float.” Toby chuckled. “And wasn’t he peeved with me!”

“I guess you were horribly superior and nasty,” said Phebe. “You can be, you know.”