Chapter VIII: Left in the Lurch

The two young cruisers in the motor boat could not say a single word when these astounding words reached their ears.

Meanwhile the other craft had drawn quickly nearer, and Jack could even make out the fact that the men crowded in her seemed to be in some sort of uniform, for he certainly discovered brass buttons.

Then it was not a joke, nor yet some sort of trick being played by cunning river vagrants in order to catch the boys off their guard.

Jimmie was rubbing his eyes, and muttering to himself, as though he began to believe he might be dreaming.

"Don't think of offering any resistance, you rascals!" continued the gruff voice in the nearby boat; "because we're ready to give you a volley. Take hold there, Grogan. Now aboard with you!"

A couple of burly men came sliding into the natty little motor boat. Then lights flashed in the faces of the two astonished occupants.

"Say, they're a couple of boys, Cap!" exclaimed the man who had grasped hold of Jack, as the glow of his lantern illuminated the face of the skipper of the _Tramp_.

"Guess you've made a little mistake, mister," remarked the boy, as calmly as he could, for he was naturally more or less excited.

"Hold on there!" bellowed the leader of the expedition, as he started to clamber aboard; "don't let up on 'em a minute, men! Just remember the account said something about the thieves being young chaps, with smooth faces. This is the boat to a dot; and I reckon we've got our men!"

But even he was more or less shaken when he came to look into the smiling countenance of Jack Stormways.

"Take a look around," he said, presently. "Perhaps you may find the evidence we want, and the plunder. These are the days of the young men. I've known mere kids to undertake jobs that long ago would have staggered old professionals."

While two of the men were upsetting things in their eager search, the man who had been called "Captain" once more turned to Jack.

"Who are you fellows, where'd you come from, and what are you doing here up this creek?" he demanded, harshly, as though expecting to scare the other into a confession of guilt.

"My name is Jack Stormways, and his is Jimmie Brannagan. We are on our way south on a little race to New Orleans. There are two other motor boats in the match, and a prize of the Dixie silver cup falls to the winner."

"Well, you've got that down fine, anyhow," remarked the big officer, with what sounded like a sneer. "Perhaps it's the truth, and again it may be all hatched up to pull the wool over the eyes of honest officers. What would you think if I told you there was a thousand dollars reward out for each of you if taken; and five times that if the swag is found intact?"

"I'd think some one was valuing me pretty high, considering that I've never as yet done anything to make it worth while capturing me," replied Jack, pleasantly.

His manner was apparently having an effect on the burly officer, who again surveyed the face of the boy by the aid of his own dark lantern. The two men were all this while making a sad mess of things in the boat, turning waterproof clothes bags inside out, upsetting the stores so neatly packed away in order to give all the room possible, and making things look "sick" as Jimmie afterwards observed.

"What's that you've got, Grogan?" suddenly demanded the captain, as he saw one of the others looking closely at something he had picked up.

"A newspaper with something marked by a blue pencil, Cap," replied the other. "And by the powers, if it ain' an account of that Waverly robbery, too!"

Immediately the captain became severe again, and shot a triumphant look at the boy, even as he let a heavy hand fall on Jack's shoulder.

"Say you so, Grogan?" he exclaimed. "Hold it out here, so I can see. Well, now, that looks like a find worth while. A paper with a marked account of the bank robbery, and in the possession of these innocent boys. How would you account for such a thing, my fine fellow?"

"Nothing easier, Captain," replied Jack, readily. "You never heard that we belong in that little town where the paper is published. I've been in that bank more than a few times when over in Waverly on business."

"Sure you have; ain't that just what we're saying?" declared the man named Grogan.

"Keep still, Grogan, and let me do the talking. Go on, young fellow; tell how the paper chances to come in your possession, and who marked it?" the one in authority continued.

"I suppose my father marked that with a blue pencil, because he knew all of us would be deeply interested. Besides, when we read the description of the mysterious motor boat we recognized that it was a ringer for my own little _Tramp_ here."

Grogan was apparently inclined to be incredulous. While he dared not break in again with any remark of his own, he took occasion to sniff as loudly as he could, and in this manner show his utter disbelief in the story given out by the skipper of the craft they had boarded.

"Then the paper came by mail?" continued the captain, as he examined it again.

"Surely," replied Jack. "One of my companions got it at Quincy, where others received letters; but this was the only thing for me. You can see the creases plain enough, where it was folded several times."

"Yes," the other went on, cautiously; "it has that appearance, though any smart chap could do the same thing if he had his wits about him. But I suppose you boys can easily prove you are what you claim?"

"Sure we kin!" spoke up Jimmie just then. "Give me the chanct, and I'll show ye lots of things to prove I niver had but the one name, and that was Jimmie Brannagan."

"There's another thing I just thought of, Captain," Jack broke in with.

"Well, let's have it then. For unless you satisfy me that you're the parties you say I shall consider it my duty to take this boat back with me, and both of you boys in the bargain."

"Let me have the paper, please," said Jack. "Officer Grogan didn't look inside, or he might have seen another article, marked with a blue pencil too."

"Look out, Cap," warned the suspicious one; "mebbe he just wants to tear it into finders [Transcriber's note: flinders?], and destroy incriminating evidence."

"Give him the paper, Grogan; I'll be responsible for its safety," returned the captain, who seemed to be drawn more and more toward a belief in Jack's innocence; for there was something in the clear gray eyes that met his gaze to convince him that this lad could never be a desperate criminal.

So Jack turned the local sheet inside out.

"There it is, Captain; please read it, and see if you can believe what I told you to be the truth," and Jack thrust the paper into the other's grasp.

"What's this?" exclaimed the burly officer, as he read, "an account of a race to the Crescent City, in which six young fellows, well known to most of the readers of this paper, have entered, the prize to be a magnificent silver cup donated by Mr. Stormways, the father of the skipper of the _Tramp_!"

Grogan uttered a disgusted grunt, as if keenly disappointed because apparently he had made a dismal failure in trying to fasten the robbery upon these two lads. Doubtless he had been figuring on what he would do with his share of the prize money, and hated to see his rosy visions fade away so soon.

"And this is that same little _Tramp_, sir," continued Jack, pleasantly; "as you can see for yourself if you take a look at the stern, where the name is painted in gold letters. We are unfortunate enough in having a boat that seems to resemble the one supposed to have been used in their flight down the river by the robbers. But if you care to wait long enough for me to get out some letters I have, I am sure you will be convinced of our entire innocence."

"Say no more, Jack," declared the captain, heartily. "I'm satisfied right now that we've been misinformed when told that a boat answering the description of the one in which those two yeggmen fled, was seen to enter here this afternoon; and that two young men were aboard her."

"What time in the afternoon, Captain?" asked Jack, quietly, though with a purpose in the question.

"The man who talked to me over the phone, said he had arrived in the suburb where he lived at four o'clock. He had been out in his motor, and was crossing a bridge here when the boat passed under, going up. He could not be sure to the minute, but reckoned that was somewhere around two p. m."

Jack turned to Jimmie. His face shone with eagerness, for a faint suspicion that had been creeping into his head was now rapidly becoming a certainty.

"Tell the captain, Jimmie, when we came in this creek," he said, quietly.

"Twelve minutes till four, it was, sir," replied Jimmie, promptly.

"Oh! what made you take such exact notice of the time, may I ask?" the officer went on, curiously, though plainly interested.

"We are compelled to make a memorandum of our stoppings. The conditions of the race forbid any boat to be moving south before eight in the morning, or after four in the afternoon. So I can show you in my notebook how an exact record is kept of such things. It will be figured on when the race is decided. We are going by stations you see, Captain, that are about two hundred miles apart. At each station we wait for the slowest boat, and then make a new start."

"It was about four-twenty when the gentleman called me up," observed the police officer; "and he had a long way around to go after leaving here. He could never have made it if it was your boat he saw."

"There's another thing, Captain," said Jack, smiling.

"Please let me hear what it is, my boy," returned the other, eagerly now, for he was beginning to comprehend that this was no ordinary young chap with whom an error of judgment had thrown him in contact.

"Did the gentleman in the auto say that the motor boat went _under_ the bridge at the time he saw it?" Jack pursued.

"That's just what he did say," replied the captain. "Of course he only had one quick look as his machine traveled over the bridge crossing the creek; but even then it seemed to him the boat had a familiar look. And then, later on it suddenly dawned on him that it just fitted a description he had been reading in a St. Louis paper about the mysterious motor boat of the bank thieves."

"All right, Captain. We have not been up as far as the bridge, as we anchored right here when we came in. But, Captain," Jack continued, earnestly, "both of us believed at the time that there must be some sort of a motor boat up yonder, for we saw a piece of oiled waste floating down on a chip of wood, as if some one had been wiping an engine, and thrown it aside."

"Well, what do you think of that?" exclaimed one of the listening officers. "It beats anything our best detectives could have done. But say, Cap, I hear something moving close by. There it is again! There's a boat coming down, and being poled, too."

"Turn your lights around that way, quick!" cried the police captain, as though he grasped the true significance of the sound.

As the men did so the dim outlines of a motor launch were discovered not far away, with one man using a pole at the stern to hasten its departure.

Jack understood what it meant, even as must the officers; for as seen in the faint light from the dark lanterns the strange boat was an exact duplicate of his own little _Tramp_!

"There they go, Cap! Sure it's the rascals all right!" shouted Grogan, forgetting how he had been so sure that Jack and Jimmie were the guilty parties.

Immediately the second man aboard the other boat must have turned the engine over, for there sounded a quick popping, and the launch began to glide through the still waters of the wide creek with increasing velocity.

"Stop! Hold up, there! You are under arrest!" bawled the captain, as he started to fire a pistol he had snatched from his pocket.

The man aboard the fugitive boat ducked; and as the craft faded away in the darkness of the night a derisive laugh came floating back to the ears of the officers.