Chapter XVI: Looming Peril

Many times in his young life Johnny had been on his own, but never quite like this.

“Not a bit of good to row,” was MacGregor’s decision. “We’ve not the least notion which way to go. If there was a breeze we might row by that. There’s no breeze.”

“No sun, moon or stars, either,” Johnny agreed.

For a full half hour they sat there in silence. Off in the distance a seal barked. Closer at hand an eider-duck quacked to his mate. A sudden scream, close at hand, startled them for an instant. It was followed by a wild laugh. They joined in the merriment. It was only a loon.

There came a wild whir of wings. A flock of wild ducks, flying low and going like the wind, shot past them.

“That’s north,” Johnny exclaimed. “They’re going due north to their nesting place. That’s east,” he pointed. “All we have to do is to row that way. We’ll come to land.”

“If you kept your course, which you couldn’t,” MacGregor chuckled.

“It’s worth trying. Anyway, I’m cold,” Johnny began to row. “There may be other bird flights to set me right.”

There were not, at least not for fifteen minutes. When at last a pair of loons with long necks stretched straight before, passed them, to his disgust, Johnny saw that the boat was headed due north.

“Well,” he sighed, dropping his oars, “At least I—”

“Listen!” MacGregor put up a hand.

Johnny listened. “Say! That’s no seal.”

“Nor a bird either. That’s a human sound.”

“Like someone trying to start a motor.”

“Just that.”

For a time the sound ceased. Then it began again.

“Over to the left.” Once again Johnny took up the oars. This time he rowed slowly, silently. No telling whose motor had stalled. Fisherman, trapper, or Oriental? Who could tell?

Four times the sound ceased. Four times Johnny’s oars rested on the surface of the water.

When, at last, a small, dark spot appeared on the surface of the sea, Johnny fairly ceased to breathe.

“Heck!” said a voice in that fog.

“Doesn’t sound like an Oriental,” Johnny whispered.

“Fisherman nor trapper either,” replied MacGregor.

Leaning even more gently on his oars, Johnny sent his boat gliding forward. Then, of a sudden, he dropped his oars to stare.

“It’s that girl, Rusty,” he whispered hoarsely.

“The same,” MacGregor agreed.

There could be no doubt about it. The girl was bending over to give her flywheel one more turn. Over her boy’s shirt, high boots and knickers she had drawn a suit of greasy coveralls. On her face, besides a look of grim determination, there was a long, black smudge.

“Heck!” she exclaimed once more.

“Havin’ motor trouble?” MacGregor spoke aloud.

The girl started so suddenly that she all but lost her balance. Then, after a brief spell of unbelieving silence, she said, “It’s you, Mr. MacGregor! How glad I am to see you! I’ve been lost for hours. I—I went out to hunt the Shadow, that shadow you know. My motor’s stalled. But now—”

“Now we’re all lost together,” MacGregor chuckled.

To Johnny, the girl gave never a second look.

“Do—do you suppose you could start it?” she said to MacGregor, nodding at her motor.

“No harm to try. At least we’ll come aboard for a cup o’ tea,” MacGregor chuckled.

Johnny rowed the lifeboat alongside the girl’s boat, the _Krazy Kat_, and they climbed aboard.

“She’s not gittin’ gas,” said MacGregor, after he had turned the motor over twice.

“I know,” the girl’s brow wrinkled.

Without saying a word, Johnny scrambled back to the box covering the gas tank. After lifting the box off, he struck the tank a sharp rap. The tank gave off a hollow sound.

“You might try putting some gas in your tank,” he said with a sly grin.

“Oh, but there must be gas!” the girl exclaimed. “There must be.”

“Perhaps,” said Johnny. “But it’s empty. May be a leak.” Drawing a small flashlight from his pocket, he bent over and examined the offending tank.

“Yep,” he said, “there is a leak, a small hole, but big enough. Your gas is in the bottom of the boat, along with the bilge water. Any reserve supply?”

“Not a bit.”

“Well, then, here we are.” Johnny took a seat. “Now we have two boats and there are three of us. The motor-boat won’t go, but—”

Suddenly he sprang to his feet. “You’d have a compass, wouldn’t you?”

“Ye-es,” the girl replied with evident reluctance, “but it—it’s out of order. That’s why I got lost.”

“Well, anyway,” Johnny said with forced cheerfulness, “now there are three of us. Two’s company and three’s a crowd. I always have liked crowds. Besides,” the corners of his mouth turned up, “you’ve got something of a cabin.”

“Oh, yes.” The girl seemed, for the moment, to forget that she was speaking to one who had knocked her beloved daddy out. “Yes, there is a cabin. There’s a small stove and—and some wood. There’s tea and some pilot biscuits.”

“A stove, wood, tea and pilot biscuits?” Suddenly MacGregor seized her and waltzed her about in a narrow circle. “Rusty, me child, you are an angel.”

A half hour later found them comfortably crowded into Rusty’s small cabin. They were sipping tea and munching hard round crackers.

“The fog’ll lift after a while,” MacGregor rumbled dreamily. “We lost our boat. That’s bad. But there’s marine insurance. That’s good. We’ll have another boat. I wonder,” he paused to meditate, “wonder what Blackie and the others are thinking by now.”

“And doing,” Johnny suggested uneasily.

“Yes, and doin’,” MacGregor agreed.

A half hour later, growing restless, Johnny crept from his corner, opened the cabin door and disappeared up the narrow hatch.

Ten seconds later he poked his head into the door to exclaim in a low, tense voice, “MacGregor, come up here quick.”

MacGregor came. The girl came too. For a full half minute the three of them stood there speechless. They were looking up and away. Their eyes were wide and staring.

“MacGregor,” Johnny asked, “what is it?”

“A ship,” MacGregor whispered. “A thunderin’ big ship. She’s not two hundred leagues away. She’s not movin’, just driftin’. That’s how she came close to us.”

“Wha-what ship is she?”

“Who knows, son? But I’d lay a bet I could guess the country she came from.”

“So—so could I.” Johnny’s throat was dry.

“We—we,” Rusty pulled her old sou’wester down hard on her head, “we’d better get into the life boat and row away. It—it doesn’t matter about the _Krazy Kat_. It really doesn’t.” She swallowed hard.

“We can try it,” MacGregor agreed. “But I’m afraid it’s too late.

“Well,” he added with a low, rumbling laugh. “We were lookin’ for ’em. Now we found ’em, we don’t want ’em. Come on, an’ mind you, never a sound!”