Chapter X: The Derelict

"Carl!"

It was Dick's voice and Carl was vaguely aware that his comrade was splashing toward him through the water in the boat.

"Goot-py, Tick," wailed Carl. "Dis iss der last, und ve vas a gouple oof goners! Led me take holt oof your hant as ve go down. Gompany vas goot ad a dime like dose."

"We're not going to Jones, matey, at least not right away. We've struck against a wreck of some kind and by luck I've grabbed a rope that was trailing overboard. Are you able to climb?"

"I ain'd aple, und I don'd vant to climb. I haf gifen oop, so I mighdt schust as vell go down as anyt'ing else."

Dick muttered impatiently, grabbed Carl and began tying the rope about his waist.

"Stay here," said he, "and I'll try and get you up. You'll have to help yourself a little, though."

Carl was vaguely conscious that Dick had disappeared somewhere. A few minutes later the whaleboat rolled over, was carried away, and Carl was left floundering in the water. Again he was sure he had reached the end, but again he found himself mistaken. There came a tug at the rope and Carl was hurled with stunning force against something big and heavy. Clutching the rope with his hands, he braced his feet against the object against which he had struck, and, after a fashion, started aloft. The pull on the rope helped him, and he finally floundered over a barrier, dropped on a flat surface and his wits slipped away from him.

He was utterly spent, and his unconsciousness was caused by sleep rather than by the blow he had received. When he opened his eyes, he found that it was morning, that the sun was shining, and that Dick was on his knees beside him, briskly shaking him.

"Vere ve vas, anyvay?" queried Carl, sitting up and peering around.

He was under the lee of a little house. Slippery planks, that heaved and rolled, were beneath him, and he could see the jagged stumps of two masts in the distance. A raffle of tangled rope lay near him.

"We're on a derelict," reported Dick.

"Vat iss a terelick?"

"It's a wreck that failed to go to the bottom. Having a cargo that floats, it stays on the surface, a menace to every craft that happens to be in its vicinity."

"T'anks. Iss preakfast retty, Tick?"

"We'll have to find something for breakfast before we can get it ready. It was a stroke of luck that laid us aboard the derelict. We smashed into her, in the dark, and it couldn't have happened once in a thousand times. Fortune has taken a turn with us."

Carl got up unsteadily, leaned against the side of the house behind him and looked over the cheerless prospect.

"Meppy fortune has dook some durns," he muttered, "aber she ditn't shtrain herseluf any. Vat sort oof a terelick iss dis?"

"She's a brig."

"Vat's a prig?"

"A two-masted, square-rigged vessel. Both masts are gone."

"Yah, I see dot."

"This is the galley. Under the poop, over there, is the after cabin; forward of us is the fo'c'sle."

"Vere iss der pantry? Led's try und findt a cupboardt or somet'ing vere dere iss a biece to eat. I'm so hungry, Tick, dot I don'd know vere I vas ad."

The door of the galley was closed and battened with a tarpaulin.

"The crew of the brig," said Dick, as he removed the tarpaulin, "did what they could to keep the water out. When the sticks went out of her, though, they had to quit."

The galley door was unlocked, and Dick threw it open. An odor came out to them that was far from pleasant, but they pushed into the little room and looked around.

There was a stove, serviceable although a bit rusty, and a number of pots and pans in racks. In a bin, in one corner, was a small supply of firewood. There was also a swinging cupboard, and in this the boys found a tin of ground coffee, a small can of brown sugar and a piece of salt pork that did not look any too fresh.

"Oof ve hat vater," remarked Carl, "ve could make some coffee."

"I'll hunt for the tanks and try to get some water," said Dick. "You get busy with a fire, Carl. There's a box of matches in the cupboard."

Dick took one of the kettles and left the galley. He was gone some fifteen or twenty minutes, and during that time Carl had got a fire going. At first the draft was not good, and Carl investigated and found that the stove-pipe had been stuffed with oakum to keep out the water. When the oakum was removed the fire burned finely.

Dick, highly delighted, came back with the water.

"There's a full tank," said he, "and I believe we're going to be a lot better off than we supposed."

"I know I vill," chirruped Carl, "afder I ged on der outside oof someding to eat."

"When that's done, matey, we'll go on an exploring expedition, and see what we can find."

They took their coffee out of tin cups and ate their salt pork off of tin plates. Enough knives and forks were found to serve their purpose, and hot food put them both in better spirits.

"I vonder vat Matt is doing on der _Grambus_?" remarked Carl.

"More than likely, mate," answered Dick, "he thinks we're on the steamer."

"Vich means dot der supmarine vill follow der shdeamer to ged us off. Vell, I ped you dot Matt iss a goot vays off, py now, und ven vill ve see him nexdt?"

"Ask me something easy! But we'll see him again, one of these days. As soon as he finds out that we broke adrift from the fruiter, he'll come looking for us."

"Und der Gulf of Mexico iss so pig a blace dot he vill look a long dime pefore he findts der terelick! Vere iss der valepoat? Meppy ve could use her und go py Florida, hey?"

"We can't do that. The whaleboat was damaged, and she either went down or drifted off from the wreck during the night."

"Iss dere some odder poats mit der wreck?"

"No. Captain and crew must have used them when they left."

"Den ve got to shday mit der terelick?"

"That's the sizing I give the outlook, Carl. However, we may drop in with some ship and be taken off. That's more than possible, I should say."

Having finished their meal, the boys got up and left the galley. They first looked into the fo'c'sle hatch. Like the galley door, it had been battened down, and a strong, disagreeable odor was wafted up to them. The bunks were in disorder, and Dick opened the deadlights in order to let the air blow through and sweeten up the place.

Off the fo'c'sle was a small room which had evidently been set aside for the carpenter. At any rate, it contained a small chest of tools.

"Bully!" cried Dick, taking an axe from the chest. "We can clear away the raffle and take more comfort on the wreck. If we could rig a jury mast and spread a sail, perhaps we could take this boat into New Orleans. There'd be a lot of salvage, perhaps."

"Vat's salfage?"

"That's what people get for picking up deserted ships and taking them into port. If the cargo is valuable, the salvage will run pretty heavy."

As they left the fo'c'sle and walked aft, they passed the side of the ship against which they had bumped the night before. Several ropes, from the tangle of cordage on the deck, lay over the side, some of them loose and trailing in the water, and others attached to broken yards.

"We were lucky to have slammed into the ship at just that point," observed Dick. "There were plenty of ropes for us to get hold of, and if I hadn't grabbed that rope, last night, we'd have gone under, sure as fate." He dropped his axe. "We'll leave that here, for now," he went on, "while we go aft and continue looking around."

They climbed the steps leading to the poop deck. The cabin roof rose out of the deck, and there was a row of little windows around the top of the cabin wall.

In the stern of the brig, directly back of the cabin, was the charthouse. This room was quite commodious and was furnished with heavy glass windows that had resisted the fury of the storm that had, in other ways, damaged the brig so heavily. There were two bunks in the charthouse, a deep locker, and a table. The air inside was damp and heavy, but by leaving the door open and opening the windows the atmosphere soon cleared.

"Here iss a goot blace to shleep, anyvays," remarked Carl, with a good deal of satisfaction. "Oof ve can findt a lod oof grup, den I bed you ve ged along finer as silk. Oof id vasn't for Matt, I couldn't care oof ve floated to China."

"We're not going to leave the gulf, matey," averred Dick, decidedly. "We're going to get out of this fix as soon as we can."

"Yah, meppy dot vas pedder," agreed Carl. "Vat's der name oof dis poat? All poats haf names, don'd dey?"

"We'll try and find out," said Dick.

Leaving the charthouse, he lowered himself by the rope of one of the davits--from which a dory had presumably been suspended--and read the lettering on the brig's stern.

He gave a yell of surprise and swung himself back on deck in a good deal of excitement.

"Vat's der madder?" asked Carl.

"Do you remember, Carl," answered Dick, "that Captain Sixty said, that time we talked with him in the steamer's cabin, that he had been skipper of a brig called the _Dolphin_?"

"Yah, I rememper dot."

"Well, this is the _Dolphin_!"

Carl stared blankly into the gleaming eyes of Dick Ferral, wondering why the fact should put Dick in such a taking as it seemed to have done.