The Blue Raider Part 9

He walked to the left, then to the right, followed by Meek.

'Can't see the chap, nor hear him. What d' you make of it, Ephraim?'

'He can't have fell overboard--must have strayed. Give him a hail with your powerful voice, Mr. Grinson. Save us all! I forgot the cannibals!

Don't holler, for mercy's sake!'

'I nearly did, but you 're right, Ephraim. I 'll report to the skipper, which I mean Mr. Trentham.'

'Eh--what? The Dutchman absent from his post?' said Trentham sleepily, when Grinson had roused him. 'Hoole, wake up!'

'Sure I haven't been asleep forty minutes yet,' said Hoole. 'And I gave Haan five minutes extra.'

'Where _is_ Haan?'

'Where is he? He was over there.'

'Grinson says he 's missing.'

'Missing! But----' He felt for his watch. 'What's the time? I lent him my watch.'

'Ten past four.'

'What?'

Trentham showed him his watch.

'Ten past four! It was two when I gave it him! What the deuce----'

He stopped, and stared blankly at Trentham.

'What did I say, Ephraim, me lad?' said Grinson, in what he intended for a whisper.

'What's that, Grinson?' demanded Trentham. 'What _did_ you say?'

'Well, sir, as we come along, Meek and me was saying a few things about the Dutchman's trousers, and seeing as they 'd no mark of being in sea-water, it come into my head that he didn't get ash.o.r.e swimming. And from that--which I know the little ways o' seamen--I somehow couldn't help guessing that he might 'a got restless like, and hopped the twig.'

'Deserted his s.h.i.+p, sir,' explained Meek.

'Got a bit wild like, and gone a-roaming,' added Grinson. 'Seemingly he's got it again.'

'Nonsense!' exclaimed Trentham. 'He isn't an a.s.s!'

'Guess we 'd better look for him,' said Hoole. 'He 's got my watch.'

CHAPTER V

IN THE TOILS

Trentham looked round. Mushroom Hill reared its strange form into the sky on their left hand--forty miles away, Haan had said. Between it and them stretched unbroken forest, an undulating sea of green. There was forest on their right, in front, behind.

'It's like looking for the proverbial needle in the bundle of hay,' he said.

'But we might track him through the undergrowth,' suggested Hoole. 'He couldn't pa.s.s without leaving traces--a big fellow, with big boots.'

'Yes; a solid-looking fellow, too; not the kind of man to do anything so mad as Grinson suggests.'

'Ah, sir, 'tis them as are the worst when the feeling gets a hold,' said Grinson. 'There was once a messmate o' mine, Job Grindle by name----'

'Really we must lose no time,' Trentham interrupted. 'The sun will be down in two hours or less. He was on that side, Hoole? Then let us start from there, and all keep together.'

They examined the slight eminence where Hoole had last seen the Dutchman. The plants were beaten down over a s.p.a.ce of a few yards, where the man had walked to and fro; but beyond this narrow area there was no sign of footsteps in any direction.

'Very odd,' said Trentham. 'He must have gone back the way we came.'

They retraced their steps towards the clearly marked track of their course through the forest.

''Tis my belief the cannibals come up and cotched him again,' said Meek.

'But they must have pa.s.sed us before they reached him,' said Trentham.

'He would have sung out.'

'And even if they took him by surprise a big fellow like him wouldn't have been overpowered without a struggle,' added Hoole. 'There 's no sign of it. And they would hardly have been satisfied with one victim when they might have had five. I guess Grinson is right, after all.

Now let us look at the proposition from that point of view. Say that Haan was seized with the roaming fever--that is, was more or less mad.

There's a deal of cunning in madmen, and he 'd naturally try to cover up his tracks. He would expect us to go back over our course, so that's the very way he wouldn't go. What do you say?'

'It sounds reasonable, but where are his tracks? How could he cover them?'

'Let's go back to where I last saw him. I have an idea.'

Retracing their steps to the rising ground, they examined once more the few yards which Haan had trodden. Beyond this clear s.p.a.ce trees of various species grew somewhat thickly together. Hoole went up to them and began to look closely at the trunks.

'Ah, maybe he 's sitting up aloft a-grinning at us,' said Grinson, peering up into the foliage--'for a joke, like.'

'I never could understand a joke,' murmured Meek.

'Here you are,' cried Hoole, laying his hand on a twisted and k.n.o.bby trunk. 'He s.h.i.+nned up here.'

There were on the bark scratches that might have been made by nails in a heavy sole. But Haan was not discoverable amid the leaves above.

'The madman!' exclaimed Trentham.

'With a madman's cunning,' said Hoole. 'Clearly he wanted to throw us off, and he deserves to be left to his fate. But, of course, we can't leave him to his fate. I suppose he went from tree to tree, and then dropped to earth again when he thought he had done us. It would be a hopeless job to attempt to track him through the foliage; but we know the direction in which he went, and I dare say we 'll find his traces not far away. Let us go on; scatter a little; the forest isn't thick hereabouts, and we can see each other a few yards apart. If we don't find him by nightfall, we shall simply have to give it up, camp for the night, and then make tracks for Mushroom Hill.'

Following his suggestion, they went forward in a line, looking up into the foliage, and closely examining the undergrowth for signs of its having been trampled down. Every now and then they stopped to listen; they dared not shout, but Hoole sometimes ventured upon a low whistle.