The Voyage of the Hoppergrass | Page 7

thing I knew the island had grown smaller--"
"The tide was coming in," explained Jimmy.
"But where is your canoe?" I asked him, "what have you done with it?"
The astonished look came over the young man's face.
"Why, that's so! I wonder where it has gone?"
"Land o' libberty!" said the Captain, "don't yer know?"
"Why, yes, it floated off. While I was watching the tennis-racquet animals it got loose, somehow--"
"Naturally," observed Captain Bannister, "seein' the tide was risin', an' I don't s'pose yer pulled it up on the sand."
"And the first thing I knew it was quite a distance from the island."
"Couldn't you have swum for it?" I demanded.
"Yes; but I didn't want to get all wet,--I--"
And then we all looked at his soaked clothes, and he laughed with us.
"Somehow, I didn't think of that when you came along," he admitted.
"But don't you really know where the canoe is?"
'Why, it disappeared around that point, just before I saw your boat. I really ought to get it again, because Mr. Skeels--that's the name of the man who owns it--isn't it great? I tried to make up a poem about him as I came down the river, but I couldn't get any farther than:
There was an old person named Skeels, Who lived upon lobsters and eels,--
and he did look as if he lived upon lobsters and eels, too. Or WITH them. Anyhow, he'll be down to Mr. Pike's tomorrow, asking for the canoe. And my bag, and suit-case, and all my clothes are in it, too. So I suppose I'll have to find it. Will it go out to sea?"
"It can't," said the Captain, "not till the tide turns. We'll overtake it 'fore long,--you see if we don't."
Sure enough, we did overtake it. We had hardly passed the point of land when Jimmy Toppan, who spent most of his time standing in the bow, peering ahead like Leif Ericsson discovering Vinland, sang out that he had sighted the canoe. It had drifted into some eel- grass, near the shore, and we had no trouble in getting it. Beside the bags, there were in the canoe some large sheets of paper, torn out of a sketch book. These were covered with pictures of the horse-shoe crabs,--drawn in a very amusing fashion. One sketch showed an old crab, wearing a mob-cap and sitting up in bed, drinking tea.
The stranger was delighted to get his belongings. He promptly changed his wet clothes for a bathing-suit, leaving the wet things in the sun to dry.
"Now," he said, "I'm all ready to go overboard, but it will be just like my luck not to fall over at all."
"You stay on the boat," said the Captain, decidedly; "I've rescued you twice, and that's enough for one day."
"All right, Captain. Though I don't mind being in the water. It's this desert island business that scares me most to death. There was the question of food. The--what-do-you-call--'em crabs had all gone away before you came, and I didn't think much of eating them cold, anyway. I had a piece of chocolate--"
He laughed and jumped up.
"Here it is," he said, fishing it out from a wet trousers' pocket. "I was going to divide it so as to have a piece for each day. That's the way people do when they're shipwrecked, isn't it, Captain?"
"So they say. Never had to come to that, myself."
"Well, I was stuck right off. For how did I know how many days I was going to stay on the island? The books on shipwrecks don't say anything about that. I didn't know whether to divide the chocolate into five pieces or ten,--they'd have been pretty small, if I'd had to have made it last for ten days. Do you think it would have kept me alive for ten days, Captain?"
"I dunno," replied the Captain, "but I guess yer wouldn't have stayed there so long as that. There'll be six foot of water on that bar before noon, so yer wouldn't have found the settin' quite so comfortable. Besides, some of them sharks of yours might have et yer."
"Well, then," the young man returned, "it was lucky you came when you did. The water was crowding me rather close. And now, what shall I do? Will you give me a lift as far as Little Duck Island? Or if you haven't got room enough, and I'll be in the way, why, I'll get in Mr. Skeels' canoe again, and give you an exhibition of wabbling."
He looked dismally toward the canoe, which we now had in tow behind the tender. We all told the castaway that we would be glad to have him stay with us.
"Plenty of sleepin' room on board," said Captain Bannister, "an' you said you was goin' to Big Duck, didn't yer? You stay with us, and we'll get yer