CHAPTER XXXIII. WAITING FOR THE END.

An hour had passed since Herc's despairing cry had reverberated through the gloomy cellar.

Since his vain appeal for help, the Dreadnought Boy had sat, sunk in a sort of lethargy, on the pile of sail. As the water grew higher, he had mechanically dragged the heap of canvas closer together, raising it and forming a sort of island above the rising inundation.

It was the instinct of life fighting against despair, for that he could ever escape from his prison Herc had long since deemed an impossibility.

He sat there in the darkness listening to the lapping of the water against the walls. His head was sunk in his hands and as the heavy minutes went by, from time to time he would feel the[Pg 262] water to convince himself that it actually was rising.

The high water mark on the cellar walls told him how high the tide usually climbed. Long before it had reached that mark the water would be over his head.

It was true that Herc was a first-rate swimmer, strong of limb and sound of wind. But what would that avail him, except to prolong his misery?

Already in prospect he had tasted the bitterness of the last struggle against the incoming flood of waters, the battle that grew hourly less vigorous, and then the final chapter when, too exhausted to fight longer for his life, the slimy waters would engulf him.

He wondered dully if they would ever find him. It seemed hardly likely. Who would dream of looking for him in that place? Again and again he reproached himself bitterly for the mad folly that had led him into such a trap.

[Pg 263]

The fault was his. There was no one else to blame for it. Had he not acted so hastily on impulse, all might have been well with him. Too late he realized that he had accomplished no useful purpose by penetrating into the haunt of the spies. It would have been wisdom's part first to have notified the authorities and then made his attack on the place.

"Well, I've been a chump and this is what I get for it," muttered the lad bitterly. "Good old Ned, I can't believe that he is really dead. I wonder if he'll ever learn how I ended my life in this wretched rat-hole of a place. It's a tough way to die. I wouldn't mind facing death in battle or in line of duty, but to die like this alone, in the dark, with the tide water waiting to drag me down——"

Herc pursued this line of thought no further. It bade fair to unman him. He felt a desperate desire to hurl himself against the walls, to shout, to scream, to do anything to avert his fate. But[Pg 264] he knew that nothing short of a miracle could save him now.

He struck one of his few remaining matches. The water was up to his feet!

Herc gave a groan. It was fairly forced from him. As the match spluttered out, he knew that before very long he would feel the chilly grasp of the tide at his knees, then at his waist, and then as it rose inch by inch, it would engulf him to his neck.

Then would come the struggle for life, the hopeless battle against overwhelming odds, and then—the end.

Fairly driven wild by these reflections, the unfortunate lad shouted and raved till his voice grew hoarse. But there was no answer except the ripple of the water against the cement walls and the hollow echo of his shouts as they were flung back mockingly at him.

He felt a sharp shock as the water whelmed[Pg 265] over his island of canvas. In a few minutes more it was at his waist.

Herc stood up erect and stepped off his little pile of canvas, now useless as an isle of safety. He kindled another match.

The yellow flame sputtered up and showed him the water all about him. It was knee deep and appeared to be coming in more rapidly. Over its surface was spread an oily scum from the damp floor.

Herc was glad when the match died out. He determined not to light any more, but to wait his end with as much courage as he could muster.

"I'll fight it out like a man-o'-war's-man, anyhow," he muttered, "but it's tough—tough to have to go this way."

The water rose inch by inch as remorselessly as destiny itself. Herc stood in stoical silence and felt it creeping up his body till it had reached his chest.

[Pg 266]

Only a few moments more, now, and then—the end.

Herc found himself growing strangely calm. He wondered what they would think on the ship when he failed to return. If his messmates would miss him, if Ned was safe and sound and would ever learn how his shipmate had perished.

The water was up to his chin.

A slight movement on the lad's part and a tiny wavelet spattered against his mouth. He tasted the brackish water of the tide. Herc wished that it would end right then and there. He felt that it was hardly worth while even to swim. If he was to drown, he might as well not resist his fate, but meet it passively.

But the instinct of self-preservation prevails even among the most pusillanimous. It can turn a coward into a dangerous foe. Herc struck out as the water reached his mouth.

He swam easily about, hardly thinking. His mind felt dulled and bruised. He swam mechanically.[Pg 267] He knew that the end was not far off now.

And now, in the hope that he might have overlooked some projection on the walls to which he might cling, he began feeling along them. But the cement was smooth as glass, slimy to the touch, and cold as ice.

Herc began to feel chilled. His limbs felt heavy. He no longer swam strongly about seeking, like a cornered rat, for some means of escape, but allowed himself to float or else tread water.

Bit by bit his efforts began to grow weaker. He felt that he could not keep up much longer, and somehow he did not much care.

It was just at that moment that something struck him a violent blow under the chin.

It was an old plank. Thrown into the cellar at some forgotten time, it was floating on the top of the water and had rocked against the lad at a critical moment.

[Pg 268]

Herc reached out and grasped it. Somehow the touch of it was almost as comforting to him as human companionship. Once more the tide of life, the desire to live, swelled through his veins. He was again a fighter.

Supporting himself on the plank, he began to think. By stretching out his hand he could touch the ceiling of the cellar.

Suddenly a thought flashed into his mind. If he could locate the trap-door, and it was not locked, he had a fighting chance for his life.

The thought acted on him like a stimulant. All his apathy forgotten now, Herc began feeling about the ceiling of the place. Far from wishing that the tide would recede, he was now afraid that it would do so before he had had time to locate the trap-door.

How he wished that he had a match! It was terribly tedious work feeling about that ceiling in the pitchy darkness. The planking above was rough, too, and Herc was by no means sure that[Pg 269] he could distinguish the trap-door when he came to it.

But at last, after what seemed to be an eternity of fumbling, his fingers encountered what felt like the under end of some bolts.

He guessed that he had found the fastenings of the trap-door at last. Raising himself on his friendly plank, Herc exerted his strength and pushed upward.

Sosh! The effort sent him under water. But he didn't mind that. He was sure that the door had yielded a little.

The next time he tried, he braced himself on a supporting ceiling beam by one hand while he shoved upward with the other. He almost uttered a shout of joy as he did so.

The door moved!

He inserted his fingers in the crack, and then, using his head as a lever, he drew himself up till he could rest his chest on the flooring of the passage.

[Pg 270]

The rest was easy. Within five minutes, Herc, dripping wet and chilled to the bone, was standing in the passage—safe and sound. As he stood there, he did not forget to offer up a fervent prayer of thankfulness to Providence for his deliverance.

He made his way down the passage to the front shop. It was empty. As he had suspected, the conspirators, who had made it their headquarters, had decamped.

On the floor near the door, which had been left open, Herc spied a scrap of paper. He picked it up and saw that there was writing upon it. With some difficulty he deciphered the scrawl:

"Yacht Halcyon. Erie Basin. Thence Panama."

"Now what does that mean?" said Herc to himself, scratching his head perplexedly. "I guess I'll keep this, anyhow; it may give the police a clew."

A few moments later the nattily dressed summer[Pg 271] residents of the island were astonished at the spectacle of a red-headed youth in dripping garments hurrying down the main street, inquiring anxiously the direction of the police station.

When it was found, Herc had a story to tell that resulted in detectives being scattered broadcast through the island. But all efforts to locate the conspirators were unavailing.

They had had a good start and had made the most of it.

In the meantime, Herc made his way to a wireless station maintained on the island and secured communication with the gunboat. What he learned did not decrease his uneasiness on Ned's account.

The young skipper had not returned and an officer had been detailed from the fleet to command the craft. Herc was peremptorily ordered to report on board the Manhattan at once and give an account of himself.