Read Ebook: The Border Boys Along the St. Lawrence by Goldfrap John Henry Wrenn Charles L Charles Lewis Illustrator

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Ebook has 1316 lines and 49733 words, and 27 pages

"I said 'your carelessness.' I don't care to use a harsher word. How did it happen, Malvin, that you wore a life jacket to-night?"

"A life jacket, sir?"

"Yes; the one you put on under your coat. Surely you did not have an intuition that we were going to be wrecked?"

Ordinarily a bright, lively lad, Ralph could be stern enough when he chose. His experiences out west and in old Mexico had broadened and developed the youth whom we first encountered on a visit to Jack Merrill's ranch in search of the health he had almost lost by overstudy at Stonefell College.

Ralph was not that boy now. He was the stern questioner of a man whose recent actions had surely justified him in entertaining black suspicions of the fellow. For the first time Malvin hesitated as Ralph shot out the question about the life jacket.

His voice trailed off. But Ralph pressed him harder.

"Come, I am waiting for an explanation. If one is not forthcoming I shall inform my father of your conduct."

"I don't see why I can't wear a life jacket if I want to," said Malvin, at length, in a voice that, for the first time, held a note of sullen defiance. "I know these Gallops better than you do, Master Stetson. I have always worn a life jacket when running them."

"Yes," said Hardware dryly, "you are more timid than we thought you, Malvin."

"Never mind, Harry," struck in Ralph; "tend that searchlight and keep a bright lookout for the Needles. We must pass them to port."

"All right," responded Hardware cheerfully; "luckily, there's no 'needles in a haystack' business about them. They are as clear as the freckles on Persimmons' face. Don't worry."

He began swinging the search-light off to the left-hand side of the boat, searching for the group of sharp-pointed rocks known as the Needles, which were by no means the menace to navigation that Big Nigger was.

"So you always wear a life jacket in running the rapids?" insisted Ralph, as his companion carried out his instructions.

"Always, sir; yes, sir. It's the safest plan."

"Well, I guess you are entitled to considerable praise for your foresight, Malvin," said Ralph meaningly. "You can go forward."

"All right, sir. Very well, sir," was the rejoinder. Malvin once more appeared to have full control of himself.

"What do you make of that fellow, Ralph?"

"He's a puzzle to which we have no answer--as yet," was the reply.

"Well?"

"I rather think that we are not so far off from the solution as you fancy. For instance, this business to-night."

"Let's hear what you make of it."

"Why, it looked to me as if the fellow deliberately tried to wreck the boat."

"But for what earthly reason?" demanded Ralph, in an astounded tone.

"Well, for one thing, we have supplanted him on board her. You must remember that before we came up here your dad had given Malvin absolute charge of the craft. I've heard that he took full advantage of this. The boat was seen cruising about at all hours of the night."

"Even so. Granted that he dislikes us, even hates us, although he has shown no signs of harboring such a feeling."

"I'm not so sure of that. Under that smooth manner he hides a vindictive nature. I've caught him looking at you once or twice, when he thought you weren't looking and that nobody saw him, in a way that made me think he didn't like you any too well."

"I imagine that in the answer to that lies the solution of that puzzle you were talking about a while back."

"Well, let's suppose--although I don't for a minute believe it--that he actually was fiendish enough to try to destroy the craft out of malice, would not he have gone to the bottom, too?"

"I'm not so sure. Malvin is reputed to be the strongest swimmer in these parts. He was wrecked in a canoe in the rapids once and swam to an eddy and eventually reached the shore. Then, too, to-night he had on a life jacket. Does not that point to the fact that he believed some accident was going to happen, in which it would be necessary for him to swim for his life?"

"Oh, as to that, he had a good explanation for it," responded Ralph.

"So I suppose," was Harry Ware's dry comment.

"After all, we may be unduly excited and manufacturing a melodramatic scare out of nothing at all," pursued Ralph. "Well, there go the Needles! In a minute more we'll be out of the Gallops, and for once I shan't be sorry. That was just about as near to a smash-up as I care to come."

Through the night the gray, dim outlines of a passing craft, slipping along under the shore of one of the islands which dotted the other side of the Gallops, was visible. She carried no lights and was moving at a swift rate of speed.

"Well, I'll be jiggered!" burst from Harry Ware's lips. "It's the ghost craft again."

"Ghost nothing! If we'd hit her we'd have found her solid enough, I'll bet," declared Ralph. "Clap the search-light on her, Hardware. We've seen that craft so often lately that the thing is getting on my nerves. Men who are out on lawful errands don't sneak about without lights. Let's show her up and see what sort of a boat she is, and who mans her."

Harry obediently turned his attention once more to the search-light. But though he swung it assiduously in the direction in which the "ghost craft," as he called the mysterious gray motor boat, had last been seen, its rays failed to reveal a sign of her.

"Well, she can appear and vanish in a mighty spook-like fashion, even though she may be built of solid wood and iron," declared young Ware, with conviction, as he reported no trace of the craft that had glided across their course in the darkness of the night.

The boys, whom we left so sadly puzzled by the strange appearance and almost simultaneous vanishment of the "ghost craft" at the conclusion of the last chapter, formed part of a group of healthy, high-spirited lads who are already familiar to most of our readers under the name of the Border Boys. They earned this title in the first place by their feats on the troublous Mexican frontier, where, as related in "The Border Boys on the Trail," they defeated the machinations of a notorious cattle rustler named Ramon De Barrios, who had long proved a thorn in the side of the ranchers along the frontier.

Particularly had De Barrios harassed the cattle and horses of Mr. Merrill, whose son Jack, a school-fellow of the others at Stonefell College, had invited Ralph Stetson, son of the railroad "king," and Professor Wintergreen, to spend some time with him and "rough it." In this volume the secret of the lone mission was revealed, and the boys, by pluck and brain, regained the stolen herd of stock rustled under cover of night from the Merrill ranch by De Barrios and his followers. A thrilling experience was that of the attempted dynamiting of a big irrigation dam in the midst of a violent storm, which had raised the prisoned waters almost to the breaking point. Jack Merrill and his chums succeeded in thwarting the plans of the rascals who hoped to inundate half a county and ruin much valuable property, out of revenge.

In the second volume of this series, "The Border Boys Across the Frontier," we made the acquaintance of Buck Bradley, a bluff and hearty circus manager who proved to be a trusty ally of the boys when they made their escape from a band of Mexican revolutionists. The boys' capture had followed their attempt to prevent a large consignment of arms and ammunition from being shipped from Uncle Sam's side of the line. Once more they proved their right to the title of "Border Boys," for, by a subterranean river flowing under a supposedly "haunted" mesa, they crossed the international boundary, and at once plunged into a series of strange and exciting adventures, including a ride on a big locomotive that ran the gauntlet of armed rebels.

The boys were next met, together with other old friends, in a succeeding book, which was called "The Border Boys with the Texas Rangers." Again, amid new scenes, the lads found themselves in exciting predicaments. Jack was lost in a hidden valley from which he escaped by a climb up steep and rocky cliffs, triumphing over apparently insurmountable obstacles. But his pluck and sturdy training brought him successfully through this adventure, and he rejoined his comrades in time to participate in the heading off of a wild stampede of cattle, an opportunity which tested the boys' best efforts.

In yet another volume, the experiences of the lads with the rurales of Mexico were set forth. This book was called "The Border Boys with the Mexican Rangers," and painted a picture of life in the wilder parts of old Mexico amid rugged mountains and brigand-infested plains. A clever use of an extemporized heliograph was made by the lads and saved them from a predicament into which they had been forced by a stupendous cloud-burst which swept their camp away. At a lone ranch, too, they met with some surprising adventures which culminated in a ride for life across the plains. At a grand fiesta they won several of the prizes, a feat which earned them the still further enmity of men who had good reason to dislike and fear them. In old Mexico, the land of fascinating romance, the boys surely had their full share of incident and adventure, and their experiences served to strengthen their characters and broaden their minds. To cope successfully with difficulties forms the best sort of training for lads, and our Border Boys showed that when it came to the test they were not lacking in energy or grit.

A fifth volume, called forth by the demand on the part of our readers to follow the boys still further through their lives, dealt with a different phase of their existences altogether. In "The Border Boys in the Canadian Rockies" the lads traveled on their sturdy little mustangs through a wild and rugged country. Not the least interesting phase of their experiences dealt with the mystery surrounding Jimmy, the waif, who came into their lives when they landed at a tiny way station on the Canadian Pacific Railroad. Several mysterious happenings, too, puzzled and annoyed them not a little while they were on their journey to the Big Bend of the Columbia River. These incidents involved a man of strange personality who, for no apparent reason, harassed and alarmed them on numerous occasions. However, in the end all that had appeared inexplicable was cleared up, and Jimmy, the waif, came into his own at last.

About two months before the present volume dealing with their adventures opens, the lads had accepted the invitation of Ralph Stetson's father to spend some time with him at his estate on Dexter Island, in the wonderful St. Lawrence River, that mighty outlet of the Great Lakes, which rolls its turbulent current along the border line between the United States and Canada. The scene of much historical interest in the past, the making of history is still going on along the St. Lawrence. Both the United States and Canada keep a sharp lookout for smugglers and other evildoers along the line which extends through the exact center of the great river. Interesting adventures are of almost daily occurrence in that region.

Beginning with the night upon which we encountered them in the rapids, the boys were destined to be plunged into experiences along the international boundary line that would demand all the resourcefulness and efficiency which had been developed in them by the scenes through which they had already passed.

But for the time being, at any rate, the mystery of the ghostly craft had to wait for a solution. The next day was the one selected by the boys for a joyous excursion on their swift, sure craft down the historic waters of the St. Lawrence, which has been called "the noblest, the purest, the most enchanting river on God's beautiful earth."

For a thousand miles from Lake Ontario to the sea the mighty current of the great waterway runs, embellished with islands and made beautiful by leaping rapids and swirling whirlpools. Except to the specially built river steamers these rapids, that is the larger ones, are not navigable except on the way down the river. Coming up, even the most powerful craft have to take to the canals, of which there are several, all on the Canadian side and free to all commerce.

The boys planned a quick trip down to Montreal and thence to Quebec. The return trip would have to be made more slowly, owing to the obstacles already mentioned.

Ralph Stetson, naturally studious, had found much to interest him in the history of the great river they were navigating; and, indeed, no stream in the world has more storied interest than the mighty water course that marks the border of the United States and Canada.

Jacques Cartier is generally given the credit of the discovery of the St. Lawrence, although some historians mention other candidates for the honor. Ralph's studies told him that little is known of Cartier, beyond the fact that he belonged to a hardy race of French fishermen.

With the spirit of exploration strong upon him, Cartier pushed onward, hugging the southern shore of a river eighty miles wide. To his mind, he had found the Mecca of every explorer of that day: the visionary passage to Cathay. For to discover a waterway to the far east was the dream of every early voyager.

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