All the way back to the ship the girl sat silent, with bowed head buried in her slender white hands. Jarrold, tied and harmless, on the floor of the boat, raved and swore incoherently. Not till she stood once more on the deck of the Tropic Queen, however, did the girl give way. Then as she saw her uncle, sullen and defiant now, led to the captain’s cabin where he was to be questioned, she reeled and would have fallen had not De Garros, who happened to be close at hand, caught her.
The sudden stopping of the ship had awakened most of the passengers and they had come on deck to see what was the matter.
“Here, take her below,” said De Garros to a stewardess, as the passengers crowded curiously around.
The ship was once more got under way, the boat lashed home and the voyage resumed, while in the captain’s cabin, facing Colonel Minturn, the wretched Jarrold told his story. But he expressed no sorrow, except for the failure of his mission. Captain McDonald ordered him confined in a cabin, to be turned over to the U. S. authorities when the ship reached Panama.
The sentence had hardly been executed, when a shuddering, jarring crash shook the ship.
Her way was checked abruptly and every plate and rivet in her steel fabric groaned.
Jack was thrown from his chair in the wireless room and hurled against a steel brace. He struck his head and fell unconscious to the floor.
For an instant following the shock, all was absolute silence. Then bedlam broke loose. Hoarse voices could be heard shouting orders, and the answering yells of the crew came roaring back. Women were screaming somewhere below, and men passengers were trying in vain to quiet them.
Sam was hurled out of his bunk, and, rudely awakened, found Jack lying stunned on the floor. He dashed some water over him and then ran to the bridge. Captain McDonald, firm and inflexible, stood there giving orders as calmly as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred.
“Shall I send out an S. O. S., sir?” asked Sam, striving to keep as cool as the ship’s commander.
“Not yet. I have not a full report of the extent of the injury to the ship,” was the reply. “First reports indicate that we have struck a submerged derelict.”
But as Sam went back to the wireless room, he saw the boats’ crews all standing by and every preparation being made for abandoning the ship. In an instinctive way, he felt that she had been mortally injured. She was still moving, but slowly, like a wounded thing dragging itself along.
The first officer came hurrying along the deck and shoved his head into the door.
“You had better try to raise any ship within our zone as fast as you can,” he said.
“You are going to send the passengers off?” asked Sam.
“Yes, as a measure of precaution. The derelict we struck has torn a big hole in the engine room. It is impossible to say how long we can keep afloat.”
He hurried off. Sam heard a groan and saw Jack rising on an elbow.
“What is it? What’s up?” he asked bewilderedly, and then: “Oh, I remember now. Any orders for an S. O. S., Sam?”
“Not yet. But we’re to raise any ship we can. They are sending the passengers off in the boats.”
“Wow! That was a crack I got when she struck,” said Jack, getting on his feet. “What did we hit, did you hear?”
“A submerged derelict. It has torn a big hole in the engine room.”
Jack took the key from Sam and began pounding it. But an exclamation of dismay spread over his face as he did so.
“No juice!” he exclaimed. “Or not enough to amount to anything. Here’s a fine fix.”
Below them, as they stood facing each other, thunderstruck at this disaster, every light on the ship went out.
“Dynamos out of business,” gasped Jack. He struck a match and lighted a lamp that hung in “gimbals” on the bulkhead.
They could hear the sharp staccato commands of the ship’s officers as they quelled the incipient panic that had followed the extinguishing of the lights. The boats were being filled and sent away with quiet and orderly precision, a boatswain or a quartermaster in each one. The higher officers could not leave the ship till later, by the law of the sea.
Everything moved quietly, almost silently. It was like watching a dream picture, Jack thought afterward. Luckily, the moon was bright and gave ample light for the disembarking of the passengers. It was just this, the bright moonlight, the cloudless sky and the smooth, summery sea that made it all seem so unreal. It seemed impossible that a death blow had been dealt to a mighty liner and that her passengers were in peril, on a sea like a millpond and under an unruffled sky.
Jack hastened forward to report the failure of the current, without which not a message of appeal could be flung abroad. The captain received the news without the flicker of an eyelid.
“At any rate, the passengers are all safe,” he said, “the boats are all off. Each has plenty of provisions and water and is in charge of a competent man. We are in for a long spell of fine weather and the coast is not far off. At the worst it will be a sea adventure for them with few discomforts.”
“Are you going to abandon the ship, sir?” asked Jack respectfully.
“No. My duty is to stay by her as long as I think there is a chance of saving her. The report from the engine room is that she can be run several miles yet before the water reaches the boilers. All the pumps are at work, full force, and that is the reason there is no power left for the dynamos.”
“Do you mean you are going to try to beach her, sir?” inquired Jack.
“If I can possibly do so,” was the reply. “There is an island not far to the south of here called Castle Island. If I can reach it in time and beach her, there may be one chance in a thousand of salving her, after all.”
Jack had asked all the questions he dared. Had it not been a time of such stress, he would not have ventured to ask so many.
He hurried back to the wireless room. Sam was busy at the key, but he shook his head in reply to Jack’s inquiring glance.
“Nothing doing,” he said. “Any news forward?”
“Yes. All the passengers are off and there are now on board only the officers and crew. The skipper means to run for an island called Castle Island and beach her there. He thinks that later there may be a chance of getting her hull off, if he can make it.”
“Then she is leaking fast?”
“Yes, they’ve got all the pumps going to keep the water from getting to the fires. That’s the reason we’ve got no juice.”
“Let’s look up Castle Island,” said Jack, partly to relieve the tenseness of their position as the wounded ship crawled strickenly southward and partly to keep Sam, who was making a plucky effort to fight back his fears, from thinking too much of their situation.
They soon found it—a small island shaped like a splash of gravy on a plate. It was marked with a red dot. Under this red dot, in italics, was written, “Volcano. Probably extinct.”
“Well, any old port in a storm,” remarked Jack, as he closed up the atlas.
Darkly violet under the light of the dawn-fading stars lay Castle Island. Cradled in the heaving seas it was watched by scores of anxious eyes on the Tropic Queen, now in her death struggle. The fire room crew was kept at work only by physical persuasion. The water was gaining fast now through the jagged wound in the craft’s steel side.
In the soft radiance that precedes the first flush of a tropic dawn, the two young wireless men, their occupation gone, watched its notched skyline grow into more definite shape.
As the light grew stronger, they saw that it was a bigger island than they had supposed. Vast chasms rent the sides of rock-ribbed mountains, and the place looked desolate and barren to a degree. Suddenly, too, Jack became aware of something they had not at first noticed.
From the summit of the rocky apex that topped the island, a smudge of smoke was blurred against the clear sky.
“The volcano!” exclaimed the boys in one breath.
“But I thought it was extinct,” said Sam, in a dismayed voice. The thought of being in the proximity of an active volcano was anything but pleasing to him.
“Extinct volcanoes smoke sometimes,” said Jack. “I’ve read of several in Mexico that do.”
On the bridge, gray-faced from their long vigil, the ship’s officers clustered about Captain McDonald, watched with anxiety the growing outlines of the island.
“There are shoals of sand off to the southeast there,” said the captain. “I was here years ago when I was an apprentice on the old Abner A. Jennings. If we can reach them the old ship will lie easy unless bad weather comes on.”
The steamer crept slowly forward. She hardly seemed to move, in the minds of the impatient souls on board her. But at last the water began to show green under her bows, signifying that she was getting into shoal waters. On and on she crawled, till she was a scant quarter of a mile from the mantling cliffs.
It was then that Captain McDonald sent word below to let the stokers come on deck. It was none too soon. The men were working at pistol point with water up to their waists, when the word came to evacuate the stokehold. Even firearms could not have kept them in that water-filled black pit much longer.
The engines were left running and a short time later, like a tired child, the Tropic Queen cradled herself in a bed of soft sand and her voyage was over. An impressive silence hung over the ship as she grounded, which was not broken till the sharp orders that preceded her abandonment were issued.
Then all was bustle. The two remaining boats were lowered and the men sent ashore. At last all that were left on board were the officers and the two wireless boys. The men had carried ashore provisions and canvas for tents, and a stream of water that the first arrivals reported near the landing place, showed them that there was no danger of their going thirsty.
It was just as Jack and Sam were preparing to get aboard the boat that a strange thing happened. The tall, slender form of a young woman appeared on deck. It was Miss Jarrold. An instant later De Garros joined her.
“Why, I thought you were on board the other boats!” exclaimed Captain McDonald, fairly startled out of his stoic calm.
“Like myself, Mr. De Garros elected to see this thing out,” chimed in another voice, and there was Colonel Minturn.
“So we stayed below while the other passengers were being taken off,” said the young aviator, “knowing that if there was any real danger we would still be able to escape. A shipwreck was too exciting an experience to miss.”
“Well, if you want to make two fools of yourselves, I can’t stop you,” said the captain, in slightly nettled tones. “But this young lady. What is she doing here?”
“Inasmuch as my uncle is a prisoner on this ship, it was my duty to stand by him,” said the girl, firmly compressing her lips.
“But I specifically ordered that Mr. Jarrold be taken off in one of the boats,” said the captain, in a bewildered tone.
“Then whoever you gave the orders to disregarded them,” replied the girl calmly. Then quite in a matter-of-fact voice she added, “Are we going to camp on that island?”
“Till help comes, yes,” replied the captain. “I will see that you have a tent and are made as comfortable as possible, but of course you can’t expect luxuries.”
An hour later they were all on shore. Captain McDonald made an address to the men, who were quiet and orderly, telling them that the discipline in the shore camp would be the same as on board the ship, and that later on a consultation would be held and the best means of getting assistance decided upon. They had two boats and it was likely that Mr. Metcalf, in one of them, might be sent to the mainland in quest of aid.
Castle Island was a dismal-looking spot, but the boys decided to make the best of a bad business and set out, after a mid-day meal of canned provisions, coffee and crackers, for a walk along the beach. They didn’t find much of interest, however. In fact they could hardly keep their eyes off the Tropic Queen, lying on the shoals helpless with smokeless funnels, and listed heavily to port.
It was on the way back to camp that an odd thing happened. Sam was walking slightly in advance. Suddenly he turned around on Jack: “Say, what are you doing?” he demanded. “Don’t shove me.”
“I didn’t shove you,” said Jack. “I felt the same thing. I——Gracious, it’s the earth shaking!”
“Look, look at the volcano!” cried Sam suddenly.
Jack looked up at the towering, gaunt crest miles away, rearing to an infinite height above them. An immense cloud of yellow, sulphurous smoke, muddying the blue of the sky, was pouring from it.
The earth shook again sickeningly. White-faced, the boys hastened back to camp. They found Captain McDonald and the other men trying to quiet the fears of the crew, who fully believed that before night the volcano would be in eruption, burying them, maybe, in lava. They succeeded fairly well, but the men kept their eyes turned to the smoking crest almost ceaselessly.
Miss Jarrold sat apart in front of her tent with her uncle, whose bonds had been taken off.
The day wore on and the tremors were repeated from time to time. But nothing serious occurred. In fact, the marooned party began to grow used to the shocks. It was arranged that early in the morning, Mr. Metcalf, with one of the boats and a picked crew, was to set out for the mainland and summon help.
During the afternoon, to fend off his melancholy thoughts, Jack decided to write down all that had happened since the eventful voyage of the lost liner started. He begged some paper from the purser, who gave him a stack of duplicate manifests. He sat himself down, pencil in hand, and was beginning to scribble, when he suddenly stopped short and sat staring at a sheet of paper that had fallen to the ground beside him.
His eyes were centered on an entry at the top of the page. There didn’t appear to be much about the entry to cause Jack’s pulses to throb with a wild hope and his heart to beat quicker, but they did. Here is what he read:
“To Don Jose de Ramon, Electric Supplies, Santa Marta. 10 storage batteries from Day, Martin & Co., New York.”
Storage batteries!
Jack threw aside his writing and made for the purser.
“Where are those storage batteries for Santa Marta stored?” he asked.
“In hold Number One,” was the reply. “They are on the top of the Santa Marta cargo.”
“Can they be got at easily?” asked Jack.
“They are among the ‘fragile’ goods,” was the reply, “on the port side of the hold. They were to be the first things ashore at Santa Marta. But why do you want to know?”
“Oh, there’s a reason, as the ads. say,” laughed Jack.
That afternoon the two young wireless men spent in long and anxious consultation. Dark came, and from the volcano a lurid glare lit the sky, yet no heavy convulsions of the earth occurred. Supper was over and the sailors, after desperately trying to keep up their spirits by singing, turned in. Soon the whole camp was wrapped in silence. The only ones awake were Jack and Sam.
Silently, on the soft sand, the two lads crept from the camp. Around their waists they wore life belts taken from the boats, which lay on the sand where they had been pulled up. The inspiration that had come to Jack when he read that entry on the manifest, was about to be put to the test.
“You are sure you can swim it, Sam?” asked the boy as the two lads waded into the water with their eyes fixed on the black hull of the stranded steamer.
“With this life jacket on I could swim round the Horn,” declared Sam confidently.
“All right, then, here goes.” Jack struck off into deep water, followed by Sam.
The water was almost warm and quite buoyant. It was a real pleasure swimming through it in the moonlight, while at every stroke the phosphorescence rippled glowingly from their arms and legs. They reached the ship almost before they knew it, and swam around her till they found the Jacob’s ladder by which the descent to the boats had been made. They scrambled up this with the agility of monkeys, and then made their way along the steeply sloping decks till they reached the wireless room with its silent instruments. Everything there was in perfect order, except for “juice” that was needed to wake them to life. And this Jack intended to have in short order.
Working under his directions, Sam broke into the storeroom where such supplies were kept by the ship’s electricians, and got two huge coils of insulated wire. Carrying these, he followed Jack, who bore a lantern, to Number One hold. It had been broken open at Kingston and the battens had only been loosely replaced for the run to Santa Marta, so that it was an easy matter to gain access to the hold.
Down the steep iron ladder they climbed till they stood among high-piled boxes and bales. Jack flashed his lantern about and at last uttered a cry of triumph.
“There they are,” he cried, pointing to some big boxes labeled, “Jose de Ramon, Santa Marta.”
“Now for the test,” chimed in Sam.
The boys attacked the cases vigorously with hatchets they had brought with them, and soon had the ten powerful storage batteries exposed.
“Now get to work, Sam,” said Jack, producing some pliers and seizing hold of a coil of wire.
Most of my readers have, in all probability, by this time guessed Jack’s plan. It was nothing more nor less than to harness up the powerful storage batteries to the wireless apparatus, and thus secure a wave that, while not as strong as the one from the ship’s dynamos, would yet reach for two hundred miles or more.
This was the inspiration that had come to him when his eye had fallen on the momentous entry on the manifest. The boys worked feverishly. At last the batteries were connected, and it only remained to run the wires to the instruments in the wireless room. Then would come the supreme test.
At last everything was “hooked up” to Jack’s satisfaction, and he sat himself down at the key. He knew that his wave lengths would not be very heavy nor his radius large, but he calculated on the fact that already this part of the ocean was alive with scout cruisers and warships hunting for the Endymion.
With a beating heart and a choking sensation in his throat, he seized the key. Sam could not speak for excitement and suspense, but leaned breathlessly over his chum’s shoulder.
Downward Jack pressed the key.
A simultaneous shout burst from both boys’ throats. The wireless was alive once more!
A green spark, like an emerald serpent, leaped from point to point of the sender. With swift, practiced fingers Jack began sending abroad the message of disaster and the appeal for rescue.
Almost the entire night passed away without any answer reaching his ears, although he ran the gamut of the wireless tuning board. He began to fear that the current was too weak to reach any of the ships that he knew were scouring the sea for the Endymion, when suddenly, in response to his S.O.S., came a sharp, powerful:
“Yes—Yes—Yes.”
“Oh, glory!” cried Jack. “I’ve got a battleship! I know it by the sending.”
“This is the Tropic Queen,” he flashed out. “We are wrecked on Castle Island. Send help quickly. Rush aid. We are——”
A loud, terrified cry from Sam interrupted him. Through the door the whole sky could be seen a flaming, lurid red. The stranded ship shook as if in the grip of cruel giant hands. The boys were thrown helter skelter about the sloping cabin floor.
The place gleamed with the glaring, crimson light. A dreadful roaring sound filled their ears. The sands beneath them appeared to heave up and down in sickening waves like those of the unquiet sea.
Then came a vast uproar, and the two terror-stricken boys clawed their way out on the slanting deck. They looked toward the island. The sky above it was blood red. The rugged sky-line of its peaks stood out blackly against the scarlet glare. The air was full of a gas that burned the throat and choked the lungs.
“It’s the volcano!” cried Jack. “The volcano! Look!”
But Sam was clutching the other’s arm and pointing frantically seaward. Rolling toward them, its foaming head crimsoned by the lambent glare of the volcano, was a giant wave.
“Into the wireless room. Quick! For your life!” screamed Jack.
They scrambled up the sloping deck and threw themselves flat on their faces in the coop, clinging to stanchions with a death-like grip. The next instant there was a roar like a thousand Niagaras. They felt the solid fabric of the Tropic Queen lifted dizzily skyward, while tons of water roared down on her. Then there came a sickening crash that shook the boys loose from their grips and sent them rolling about the cabin. The door was burst open and they staggered out on the deck. The Tropic Queen was almost upright now, with her bottom smashed in till she stood flat upon her bare ribs in the soft sand.
Jack could see, by the glare of the burning mountain, the bleak figures of men far up among the rocks. The tidal wave, then, had been seen in time for some of them, at least, to save themselves. He had just time to observe this when before his eyes the sea sucked outward—outward—outward. The ocean floor rose into view, all crimsoned from the flaming volcano. He could see gaunt rocks uncovered for the first time since the creation, perhaps, sticking up blackly in the slimy depths.
And then the sea came back! Out in the far distance across the exposed flats a mighty wave shouldered itself. Its body and huge hollow incurve was black, but its crest was glowing with reflected flame. Jack gave one glance ashore. He could see black figures scuttling high up the rocks.
They had just time to rush into the wireless room, with its steel walls and stout foundations bolted to the iron superstructure, when, with a roar, the mighty wave swept landward. Jack and Sam felt the Tropic Queen lifted and rushed toward the shore, then lifted again and again and again till it seemed impossible that anything man-made could resist the awful force.
But at last the ship grounded with a shuddering, sidewise motion that seemed like a last expiring gasp. The boys ventured forth. The ship was lying on the beach almost at the foot of the cliffs. Her funnels and masts had vanished, snapped off like pipe stems. She lay a sheer, miserable hulk in the flaring light of the volcano.
Seaward, the waves were breaking tumultuously, but the tidal wave had spent its fury. Dizzy, sick and battered the boys made their way over the side of the lost liner and crept up the beach. It was littered with the smashed fragments of the two boats and the remnants of the hastily abandoned camp.
Through the glowing darkness a figure came toward them.
“Great heavens, boys, is it you?” they heard.
“Yes, Captain,” rejoined Jack. “We’ve come ashore.”
“Thank Heaven you are safe! We are all right except for four poor sailors who did not awaken in time. But where have you been? How did you get on board?”
“We swam out,” said Jack simply, “and had just got out a wireless call when the big blow-up came.”
“A wireless call! Are you out of your head, boy?”
“By no means,” said Jack. “We got out a call, and, better still, got an answer. I don’t know what ship it was, but it was a naval craft. I gave our position and then came the tidal wave.”
“It is our only chance,” said the captain. “Both boats were, of course, smashed, and we are marooned till aid comes.”
It was the next night. The disconsolate castaways were huddled near the pathetic wreck of the lost liner. Food had been obtained from on board, so that there was no actual suffering, but the volcano still glared and rumbled and at any moment a disastrous eruption was to be feared.
De Garros and Miss Jarrold stood together apart from the rest.
“And your uncle’s influence over you is broken forever if we ever escape from this?” he was asking.
She nodded.
“That time in Paris when he tried to persuade you to give up the aeronautical plans was when I first began to mistrust him. I never thought I should see you again after our engagement was broken off, but fate has brought us together. It has been like a dream,” she went on. “I think sometimes that he exercised a hypnotic influence over me. But I know it all now and can see things clearly.”
De Garros was about to answer, when suddenly his body stiffened. He pointed to the northern horizon.
“There,” he cried. “Look there!”
His excitement was mounting high.
“See,” he shouted, “that white light! It’s sweeping the sky! What is it?”
Far off, a faint pencil of light swung across the zenith as if on a pivot. It dipped to the horizon, rose again and swung like a radiant pendulum across the sky.
“Signals,” the girl choked out. “It’s a searchlight!”
From the seamen there came a hoarse cheer.
“It’s a battleship! She’s signaling!” shouted Jack in a voice that shook. “It’s Morse!”
He took a long breath or two. Then he choked out the message that was flung on the sky.
“Courage! We are coming!”
And then pandemonium broke loose. Under the glaring sky, seamen danced and shouted and the other members of the party shook hands. Only Jarrold stood silent and aloof, looking at his niece and De Garros. It was as if he knew that his hold over her was broken forever, and that the approaching warships, speeding to the rescue, meant for him shackles and iron bars.
The scene shifts to Colon harbor. Into port are steaming the Birmingham, scout cruiser, and the Wasp, torpedo destroyer, the craft that rescued the castaways of Castle Island. Already by wireless the story of the lost liner and the wonderful resourcefulness of Jack Ready and Sam Smalley has gone out to the world. Big crowds are waiting to meet the rescuing warships. Among them are the military attachés to whom Colonel Minturn, thanks to Jack, will be able to hand the Panama documents so nearly lost forever.
At the stern of the Wasp, under the ensign, are standing Jarrold’s niece and De Garros. He is telling her that Colonel Minturn has promised to intercede for her uncle, and that in all probability he will be deported with a warning never to tread American soil again, in place of being imprisoned. Nations do not care to advertise their troubles with international spies, if it can be avoided.
Jack and Sam, on board the Birmingham, stand happily by the wireless operator of the cruiser. He is taking a message. Presently he turns to them.
“Some news that will interest you, fellows,” he says. “All the boats from the Tropic Queen have been picked up, without the loss of a single passenger.”
“Good work!” exclaim the two listeners heartily.
“And the Endymion,” continues the operator, “has been in port for a week, and her crew and captain are detained pending an inquiry.”
“Well, I guess they’ll get out of the scrape, all right,” says Jack, “for they didn’t know what schemes Jarrold was up to when he chartered the yacht.”
“What about Cummings?” asks Sam.
“So far as I am concerned, I shall take no action,” replies Jack. “All that I am anxious for now is for a sight of the good old U. S. A. and Uncle Toby and——”
“Somebody named Helen,” chuckles Sam, while Jack turns red under his tan.
And here, with their adventures on the lost liner at an end, we will say farewell to our ocean wireless boys till we encounter them again in a forthcoming volume dealing with their further stirring adventures at the radio key.
THE END.
BOY AVIATORS’ SERIES
By Captain Wilbur Lawton
Absolutely Modern Stories for Boys
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THE BOY AVIATORS IN NICARAGUA, Or, Leagued With Insurgents
The launching of this Twentieth Century series marks the inauguration of a new era in boys’ books—the “wonders of modern science” epoch. Frank and Harry Chester, the Boy Aviators, are the heroes of this exciting, red-blooded tale of adventure by air and land in the turbulent Central American republic. The two brothers with their $10,000 prize aeroplane, the Golden Eagle, rescue a chum from death in the clutches of the Nicaraguans, discover a lost treasure valley of the ancient Toltec race, and in so doing almost lose their own lives in the Abyss of the White Serpents, and have many other exciting experiences, including being blown far out to sea in their air-skimmer in a tropical storm. It would be unfair to divulge the part that wireless plays in rescuing them from their predicament. In a brand new field of fiction for boys the Chester brothers and their aeroplane seem destined to fill a top-notch place. These books are technically correct, wholesomely thrilling and geared up to third speed.
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BOY AVIATORS’ SERIES
By Captain Wilbur Lawton
Absolutely Modern Stories for Boys
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THE BOY AVIATORS ON SECRET SERVICE, Or, Working With Wireless
In this live-wire narrative of peril and adventure, laid in the Everglades of Florida, the spunky Chester Boys and their interesting chums, including Ben Stubbs, the maroon, encounter exciting experiences on Uncle Sam’s service in a novel field. One must read this vivid, enthralling story of incident, hardship and pluck to get an idea of the almost limitless possibilities of the two greatest inventions of modern times—the aeroplane and wireless telegraphy. While gripping and holding the reader’s breathless attention from the opening words to the finish, this swift-moving story is at the same time instructive and uplifting. As those readers who have already made friends with Frank and Harry Chester and their ‘bunch’ know, there are few difficulties, no matter how insurmountable they may seem at first blush, that these up-to-date gritty youths cannot overcome with flying colors. A clean-cut, real boys’ book of high voltage.
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BOY AVIATORS’ SERIES
By Captain Wilbur Lawton
Absolutely Modern Stories for Boys
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THE BOY AVIATORS IN AFRICA, Or, An Aerial Ivory Trail
In this absorbing book we meet, on a Continent made famous by the American explorer Stanley, and ex-President Roosevelt, our old friends, the Chester Boys and their stalwart chums. In Africa—the Dark Continent—the author follows in exciting detail his young heroes, their voyage in the first aeroplane to fly above the mysterious forests and unexplored ranges of the mystic land. In this book, too, for the first time, we entertain Luther Barr, the old New York millionaire, who proved later such an implacable enemy of the boys. The story of his defeated schemes, of the astonishing things the boys discovered in the Mountains of the Moon, of the pathetic fate of George Desmond, the emulator of Stanley, the adventure of the Flying Men and the discovery of the Arabian Ivory cache,—this is not the place to speak. It would be spoiling the zest of an exciting tale to reveal the outcome of all these episodes here. It may be said, however, without “giving away” any of the thrilling chapters of this narrative, that Captain Wilbur Lawton, the author, is in it in his best vein, and from his personal experiences in Africa has been able to supply a striking background for the adventures of his young heroes. As one newspaper says of this book: “Here is adventure in good measure, pressed down and running over.”
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By Captain Wilbur Lawton
Absolutely Modern Stories for Boys
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THE BOY AVIATORS TREASURE QUEST, Or, The Golden Galleon
Everybody is a boy once more when it comes to the question of hidden treasure. In this book, Captain Lawton has set forth a hunt for gold that is concealed neither under the sea nor beneath the earth, but is well hidden for all that. A garrulous old sailor, who holds the key to the mystery of the Golden Galleon, plays a large part in the development of the plot of this fascinating narrative of treasure hunting in the region of the Gulf Stream and the Sagasso Sea. An aeroplane fitted with efficient pontoons—enabling her to skim the water successfully—has long been a dream of aviators. The Chester Boys seem to have solved the problem. The Sagasso, that strange drifting ocean within an ocean, holding ships of a dozen nations and a score of ages, in its relentless grip, has been the subject of many books of adventure and mystery, but in none has the secret of the ever shifting mass of treacherous currents been penetrated as it has in the BOY AVIATORS TREASURE QUEST. Luther Barr, whom it seemed the boys had shaken off, is still on their trail, in this absorbing book and with a dirigible balloon, essays to beat them out in their search for the Golden Galleon. Every boy, every man—and woman and girl—who has ever felt the stirring summons of adventure in their souls, had better get hold of this book. Once obtained, it will be read and re-read till it falls to rags.
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By Captain Wilbur Lawton
Absolutely Modern Stories for Boys
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THE BOY AVIATORS IN RECORD FLIGHT, Or, The Rival Aeroplane
The Chester Boys in new field of endeavor—an attempt to capture a newspaper prize for a trans-continental flight. By the time these lines are read, exactly such an offer will have been spread broadcast by one of the foremost newspapers of the country. In the Golden Eagle, the boys, accompanied by a trail-blazing party in an automobile, make the dash. But they are not alone in their aspirations. Their rivals for the rich prize at stake try in every way that they can to circumvent the lads and gain the valuable trophy and monetary award. In this they stop short at nothing, and it takes all the wits and resources of the Boy Aviators to defeat their devices. Among the adventures encountered in their cross-country flight, the boys fall in with a band of rollicking cow-boys—who momentarily threaten serious trouble—are attacked by Indians, strike the most remarkable town of the desert—the “dry” town of “Gow Wells,” encounter a sandstorm which blows them into strange lands far to the south of their course, and meet with several amusing mishaps beside. A thoroughly readable book. The sort to take out behind the barn on the sunny side of the haystack, and, with a pocketful of juicy apples and your heels kicking the air, pass, happy hours with Captain Lawton’s young heroes.
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HURST & CO.—Publishers NEW YORK
BOY AVIATORS’ SERIES
By Captain Wilbur Lawton
Absolutely Modern Stories for Boys
Cloth Bound—Price, 50c per volume
THE BOY AVIATORS POLAR DASH, Or, Facing Death in the Antarctic
If you were to hear that two boys, accompanying a South Polar expedition in charge of the aeronautic department, were to penetrate the Antarctic regions—hitherto only attained by a few daring explorers—you would feel interested, wouldn’t you? Well, in Captain Lawton’s latest book, concerning his Boy Aviators, you can not only read absorbing adventure in the regions south of the eightieth parallel, but absorb much useful information as well. Captain Lawton introduces—besides the original characters of the heroes—a new creation in the person of Professor Simeon Sandburr, a patient seeker for polar insects. The professor’s adventures in his quest are the cause of much merriment, and lead once or twice to serious predicaments. In a volume so packed with incident and peril from cover to cover—relieved with laughable mishaps to the professor—it is difficult to single out any one feature; still, a recent reader of it wrote the publishers an enthusiastic letter the other day, saying: “The episodes above the Great Barrier are thrilling, the attack of the condors in Patagonia made me hold my breath, the—but what’s the use? The Polar Dash, to my mind, is an even more entrancing book than Captain Lawton’s previous efforts, and that’s saying a good deal. The aviation features and their technical correctness are by no means the least attractive features of this up-to-date creditable volume.”
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HURST & CO.—Publishers NEW YORK
BOY INVENTORS SERIES
Stories of Skill and Ingenuity
By RICHARD BONNER
Cloth Bound, Illustrated. Price, 50c. per vol., postpaid.
THE BOY INVENTORS’ WIRELESS TELEGRAPH.
Blest with natural curiosity,—sometimes called the instinct of investigation,—favored with golden opportunity, and gifted with creative ability, the Boy Inventors meet emergencies and contrive mechanical wonders that interest and convince the reader because they always “work” when put to the test.
THE BOY INVENTORS’ VANISHING GUN.
A thought, a belief, an experiment; discouragement, hope, effort and final success—this is the history of many an invention; a history in which excitement, competition, danger, despair and persistence figure. This merely suggests the circumstances which draw the daring Boy Inventors into strange experiences and startling adventures, and which demonstrate the practical use of their vanishing gun.
THE BOY INVENTORS’ DIVING TORPEDO BOAT.
As in the previous stories of the Boy Inventors, new and interesting triumphs of mechanism are produced which become immediately valuable, and the stage for their proving and testing is again the water. On the surface and below it, the boys have jolly, contagious fun, and the story of their serious, purposeful inventions challenge the reader’s deepest attention.
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HURST & COMPANY - Publishers - NEW YORK
BORDER BOYS SERIES
Mexican and Canadian Frontier Series
By FREMONT B. DEERING.
Cloth Bound. Illustrated. Price, 50c. per vol., postpaid
THE BORDER BOYS ON THE TRAIL.
What it meant to make an enemy of Black Ramon De Barios—that is the problem that Jack Merrill and his friends, including Coyote Pete, face in this exciting tale.
THE BORDER BOYS ACROSS THE FRONTIER.
Read of the Haunted Mesa and its mysteries, of the Subterranean River and its strange uses, of the value of gasolene and steam “in running the gauntlet,” and you will feel that not even the ancient splendors of the Old World can furnish a better setting for romantic action than the Border of the New.
THE BORDER BOYS WITH THE MEXICAN RANGERS.
As every day is making history—faster, it is said, than ever before—so books that keep pace with the changes are full of rapid action and accurate facts. This book deals with lively times on the Mexican border.
THE BORDER BOYS WITH THE TEXAS RANGERS.
The Border Boys have already had much excitement and adventure in their lives, but all this has served to prepare them for the experiences related in this volume. They are stronger, braver and more resourceful than ever, and the exigencies of their life in connection with the Texas Rangers demand all their trained ability.
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HURST & COMPANY - Publishers - NEW YORK
MOTOR CYCLE SERIES
Splendid Motor Cycle Stories
By LIEUT. HOWARD PAYSON.
Author of “Boy Scout Series.”
Cloth Bound. Illustrated. Price, 50c. per vol., postpaid
THE MOTOR CYCLE CHUMS AROUND THE WORLD.
Could Jules Verne have dreamed of encircling the globe with a motor cycle for emergencies he would have deemed it an achievement greater than any he describes in his account of the amusing travels of Philias Fogg. This, however, is the purpose successfully carried out by the Motor Cycle Chums, and the tale of their mishaps, hindrances and delays is one of intense interest, secret amusement, and incidental information to the reader.
THE MOTOR CYCLE CHUMS OF THE NORTHWEST PATROL.
The Great Northwest is a section of vast possibilities and in it the Motor Cycle Chums meet adventures even more unusual and exciting than many of their experiences on their tour around the world. There is not a dull page in this lively narrative of clever boys and their attendant “Chinee.”
THE MOTOR CYCLE CHUMS IN THE GOLD FIELDS.
The gold fever which ran its rapid course through the veins of the historic “forty-niners” recurs at certain intervals, and seizes its victims with almost irresistible power. The search for gold is so fascinating to the seekers that hardship, danger and failure are obstacles that scarcely dampen their ardour. How the Motor Cycle Chums were caught by the lure of the gold and into what difficulties and novel experiences they were led, makes a tale of thrilling interest.
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HURST & COMPANY - Publishers - NEW YORK
DREADNOUGHT BOYS SERIES
Tales of the New Navy
By CAPT. WILBUR LAWTON
Author of “BOY AVIATORS SERIES.”
Cloth Bound. Illustrated. Price, 50c. per vol., postpaid
THE DREADNOUGHT BOYS ON BATTLE PRACTICE.
Especially interesting and timely is this book which introduces the reader with its heroes, Ned and Here, to the great ships of modern warfare and to the intimate life and surprising adventures of Uncle Sam’s sailors.
THE DREADNOUGHT BOYS ABOARD A DESTROYER.
In this story real dangers threaten and the boys’ patriotism is tested in a peculiar international tangle. The scene is laid on the South American coast.
THE DREADNOUGHT BOYS ON A SUBMARINE.
To the inventive genius—trade-school boy or mechanic—this story has special charm, perhaps, but to every reader its mystery and clever action are fascinating.
THE DREADNOUGHT BOYS ON AERO SERVICE.
Among the volunteers accepted for Aero Service are Ned and Herc. Their perilous adventures are not confined to the air, however, although they make daring and notable flights in the name of the Government; nor are they always able to fly beyond the reach of their old “enemies,” who are also airmen.
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HURST & COMPANY - Publishers - NEW YORK
BUNGALOW BOYS SERIES
LIVE STORIES OF OUTDOOR LIFE
By DEXTER J. FORRESTER.
Cloth Bound. Illustrated. Price, 50c. per vol., postpaid
THE BUNGALOW BOYS.
How the Bungalow Boys received their title and how they retained the right to it in spite of much opposition makes a lively narrative for lively boys.
THE BUNGALOW BOYS MAROONED IN THE TROPICS.
A real treasure hunt of the most thrilling kind, with a sunken Spanish galleon as its object, makes a subject of intense interest at any time, but add to that a band of desperate men, a dark plot and a devil fish, and you have the combination that brings strange adventures into the lives of the Bungalow Boys.
THE BUNGALOW BOYS IN THE GREAT NORTH WEST.
The clever assistance of a young detective saves the boys from the clutches of Chinese smugglers, of whose nefarious trade they know too much. How the Professor’s invention relieves a critical situation is also an exciting incident of this book.
THE BUNGALOW BOYS ON THE GREAT LAKES.
The Bungalow Boys start out for a quiet cruise on the Great Lakes and a visit to an island. A storm and a band of wreckers interfere with the serenity of their trip, and a submarine adds zest and adventure to it.
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HURST & COMPANY - Publishers - NEW YORK
FRANK ARMSTRONG SERIES
Twentieth Century Athletic Stories
By MATHEW M. COLTON.
Cloth Bound. Illustrated. Price, 60c. per vol., postpaid
FRANK ARMSTRONG’S VACATION.
How Frank’s summer experience with his boy friends make him into a sturdy young athlete through swimming, boating, and baseball contests, and a tramp through the Everglades, is the subject of this splendid story.
FRANK ARMSTRONG AT QUEENS.
We find among the jolly boys at Queen’s School, Frank, the student-athlete, Jimmy, the baseball enthusiast, and Lewis, the unconsciously-funny youth who furnishes comedy for every page that bears his name. Fall and winter sports between intensely rival school teams are expertly described.
FRANK ARMSTRONG’S SECOND TERM.
The gymnasium, the track and the field make the background for the stirring events of this volume, in which David, Jimmy, Lewis, the “Wee One” and the “Codfish” figure, while Frank “saves the day.”
FRANK ARMSTRONG, DROP KICKER.
With the same persistent determination that won him success in swimming, running and baseball playing, Frank Armstrong acquired the art of “drop kicking,” and the Queen’s football team profits thereby.
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HURST & COMPANY - Publishers - NEW YORK