Dave Fearless and the Cave of Mystery Part 17

"No, it isn't," declared Dave, swinging back as Gerstein made a grab at the garment. "It belongs to Barlow."

"I have something in it."

"I know you have."

"Ha, you spy! Let go, let go."

The result of a general mixing up of Dave and Gerstein was that each now had hold of the coveted garment.

As Gerstein spoke last he sagged and swung Dave around to one side.

Dave held on tightly. Suddenly Gerstein made a feint. He slackened the tension by a bend forward, one hand swung out.

Dave received a heavy blow at the side of the head. It was totally unexpected, and he loosed his grip and went reeling backward.

At that moment a terrific wave swept over the deck. Dave was submerged and carried along.

He tried in vain to catch at something. The tilt of the steamer sent him shooting outward, and the next moment he plunged over the rail into the sea below.

CHAPTER XIII

ADRIFT ON THE PACIFIC

The sea had been the natural element of Dave Fearless since his earliest childhood. In the stress of his present predicament, however, he felt that he was in the most critical situation of his life.

A great wave received him as he went overboard. A second swept over it, ingulfing him for a full half-minute, and he was battling desperately with the vortex caused in part by the storm, in part by the swiftly-moving steamer.

As the youth emerged into less furious elements, his first thought was of the _Swallow_. He dashed the water from his eyes with one hand and strained his sight.

"It's no use," he spoke. "She'll be out of reach in two minutes."

Dave did not try to shout. It would have done him no good, he realized.

As he was lifted up on the crest of wave after wave, the vague spark of light that designated the _Swallow_ grew fainter and farther away.

Finally it was shut out from view altogether.

The water was buoyant, and aided by his expertness as a swimmer Dave did not sink at all, and found little difficulty in keeping afloat. But how long could this state of things last? he asked himself.

There was not the least possible hope of any aid from the _Swallow_. He had gone overboard unseen by any person except Gerstein.

"He will tell no one," reflected Dave. "In the first place it would be dangerous for him to do so, for they would suspect treachery on his part. In the next place he is probably glad to get rid of me. Unless Bob or father look into my stateroom, I shall not be missed before morning. By that time----"

Dave halted all conjecture there. The present was too vital to waste in idle surmises. He planned to use all the skill and endurance he possessed to keep afloat. He might do this for some hours, he calculated, unless the waves grew much rougher.

"It's a hard-looking prospect," Dave told himself, as he began to feel severely the strain of his situation. "Adrift on the Pacific! How far from land? As I know, the _Swallow's_ course was out of the regular ocean track. The chances of ever seeing father and the others again are very slim."

Something slightly grazed Dave's arm as he concluded this rather mournful soliloquy. He grabbed out at the touch of the foreign object, but missed it. Then a second like object floated against his chest.

This the lad seized.

It proved to be a piece of wood, part of a dead tree, about three inches in diameter and two feet long. Dave retained the fragment, although scarcely with the idea of using it as a float.

To his surprise these fragments, some large, some small, continued to pa.s.s him. In fact, he seemed in a sort of wave-channel, which caught and confined them, forming a species of tidal trough.

One piece was of quite formidable size. Dave threw his arms over it with a good deal of satisfaction, for it sustained his weight perfectly.

"Queer how I happened right into their midst. Where do they come from, anyhow?" reflected Dave. "Is it a hopeful sign of land?"

There was a lull in the tempest finally, but the darkness still hung over all the sea like a pall. Dave longed for daybreak. The discovery of the driftwood had given him a good deal of courage and hope.

For over eight hours Dave rocked and drifted, at the mere caprice of the waves. Wearied, faint, and thirsty, he tried to cheer himself thinking of the possibility of land near at hand.

Daylight broke at last, but a dense haze like a fog hung over the waters for an hour before the sun cleared it away. Eagerly Dave scanned in turn each point of the compa.s.s. A great sigh of disappointment escaped his lips.

"No land in sight," he said; "just the blank, unbroken ocean."

His plight was a dispiriting one. Dave felt that unless succor came in some shape or other, and that, too, very soon, his chances of ever seeing home and friends again were indeed remote.

He noted the widespread ma.s.s of driftwood with friendly eyes, for it broke the monotony of the green expanse that tired the sight with its illimitable continuity.

"There's a pretty big piece of driftwood," Dave said, looking quite a distance towards a larger object than he had yet seen. It rose and fell with the swaying of the wave. "If I could find a few such pieces I might construct a raft."

Dave began to swim off in the direction of the object in the distance.

A great cry of joy escaped his lips as he neared it.

"It is not a log," he shouted rapturously, "but a boat. A small yawl.

Oh, dear, but I am thankful!"

In his urgency to reach the boat Dave let go of the piece of driftwood that had served him so well. His eyes grew bright and he forgot all his discomfort and suffering.

With a kind of cheer Dave lifted himself over the side of the little yawl. It was flimsy, dirty, and old. The prow was splintered, one of the seats was broken out, but Dave sank down into the craft with a luxurious sense of relief and delight.

There were no oars, but Dave did not think much of that. He had something under him to sustain him. That was the main thing for the present.

"I can make rude oars of some of the driftwood and the front seat," he calculated. "If it rains I shall have water, and there are clouds coming up fast in the west now. I may catch some fish. What's in there, I wonder," and Dave pulled open the door of the little locker.

"Hurrah!" he shouted this time, utterly unable to control his intense satisfaction. Lying in the locker was a rudely made reed basket. In this were two bottles. Dave speedily a.s.sured himself that they held water, warm and brackish, but far from unwelcome to the taste.

About twenty hardtack cakes and a chunk of cheese completed the contents of the basket.

"I never ate such a meal before," jubilated Dave, having satisfied his hunger and carefully repacked the supplies. He paused to read a part of a label pasted across the front of one of the bottles of water. "This came from the _Raven_."

Dave had a right to think this. At one time the bottle had held some kind of table sauce. Written under the label were the words "Captain's table, _Raven_."

"The boat, too, must have belonged to the _Raven_" said Dave, "although I don't know that surely. It looks as if some one of Captain Nesik's crew had put to sea in this yawl, and was probably lost in the storms of the last week."

A great rain came up about an hour later. There was not much wind.