this time the lost oar had completely disappeared and the dory was making little headway.
Suddenly Jo shouted from the bow, “Turn the boat around, Will! Turn it while you can! There’s a whirlpool beyond us where all those birds are.”
“Whirlpool?” asked Will.
“Yes, sir. I mean it. That’s what made the oar skedaddle so fast. It got caught in the current and pulled along. Don’t you see the whirlpool now?” Jo asked as he pointed.
All three stood cautiously to look across the water. Now the others could see the whirlpool, dark streaks of current winding into a common center. Here was a glassy funnel of sea water, a terrifying version of what happened in the bathtub when the plug was pulled and water rushed down the drain.
“Turn around, Will, turn the dory ’round!” Jo shouted.
Will returned to his skulling and tried to head the bow toward home. The only result was that the dory traveled sideways instead of bow first.
Lettie was down on the floor boards once more. As she shivered and crouched, she envied the strange sea birds. They could fly over this dangerous spot and leave it at will. She hugged her knees and tried not to think about a story she had once read of people sucked into a maelstrom of circling water.
“If only we had a bailing can we could at least get rid of some of the water in the dory,” Jo said, although he knew they had none.
The whirlpool drew all their attention. They never thought of looking away from the vortex that was nearer all the time. So absorbed were they that a small boat with a powerful outboard motor surprised them as it planed up to them. It circled the dory and set it rocking in its wake.
“Why, it’s Black Bart, I bet you anything,” Lettie shouted.
“Sh-sh, he’ll hear you,” Will said. The boat was coming close.
It was Bart Simes, he said so himself, as he came alongside. Then he called, “Got a line aboard there, you kids? Throw it to me if you do and I’ll tow you in.”
Will longed to accept this offer but he answered, “Maybe we can make it by ourselves.”
“Thank you all the same,” said Lettie, making her voice as icy as her wet feet because she spoke to their common enemy.
“Don’t be such goons. Of course you can’t make it in. Been watching you for the last half-hour through my binoculars. I would have come sooner only I thought you needed a lesson. Now if you’ve got a line there, throw it. What about that line roved through your bow. Is that any better than a spiderweb?”
Jo picked up the bow line. It was weathered gray and very soft but he threw it toward Bart. It fell into the water far from the mark. Jo hauled it in, coiled it, and tried the shot again. Bart caught it. As he fastened it to a cleat in the stern of his boat, he fussed at the three in the dory.
“Mary Pete’s a mighty smart woman. You’d think she might have been smart enough to warn you about taking out old boats that haven’t been in the water going on a hundred years or so, especially dories. They’re likely to drop their bottoms out. And she should have told you several other things, such as how strong the current sets off here. And how, when the tide comes piling in, you can expect the whirlpool.”
“Mary Pete is a very busy woman,” said Lettie in her icy tone.
“And I’m a busy man. Let’s go,” Bart almost growled.
He pulled the starter cord on his motor and they moved off in a great curve. The dory, heavy with water, yawed from side to side like an animal being led to slaughter. Lettie was the only one who looked back at the whirlpool. She wanted to gaze down into its glassy funnel but Bart had snatched them to safety too early. She could only study small whirlpools like dimples that dotted the surface around them.
From time to time Bart turned to check on his tow. Will, as captain in the dory, felt he must wave to show all was well. He did it in a moderate sort of way; they mustn’t give Black Bart the false idea that they wanted to be friendly.
They were almost off the boathouse when the water in the dory stopped sloshing and the miniature waves corrugating its surface vanished. The old line had parted, they realized. Bart had left them behind. Soon he missed his tow and circled back.
“It’s a miracle the bottom didn’t drop out of that old-timer you picked to have yourself a time in. As I said, there’s a whole lot Mary Pete ought to tell you. Too bad she’s so busy,” he called to them.
Lettie stood up for Mary Pete. “This morning,” she said, “she had to hurry off and put up a prescription for someone foolish enough to get himself upset banqueting with politicians.” Lettie hoped that she sounded both dignified and unfriendly.
“So that’s what she told you,” Bart said curtly with a dark scowl. “Well, I guess you don’t need my help any longer. You’re practically in now.” His tone implied that it would do them good to struggle on with one oar. “For the love of Mike, if you kids have to get in scrapes, at least do it in a seaworthy boat. Come over any time and borrow one of mine. All Mary Pete’s got need a heap done on them, caulking, painting, probably a whole lot more. Yes, you come over to my wharf. I’ll fix you up with a boat.”
Lettie was about to say, “No, thank you,” in the icy tone she was beginning to enjoy, when Will spoke. “Thanks, we may do that.”
Bart planed off toward his wharf.
“How could you say you’d borrow a thing from him?” said Lettie.
“Don’t you see,” said her brother, “it will give us an excuse to go over there. You never can tell, we might just discover he was up to some skulduggery. We could use it against him to save the old house. At least it would make it easier to keep a watch on him.”
Jo agreed with Will. “Yes, it might help us if we could hurt him.”
“Even if he did save our lives, I still hate him. Makes me think of a shark or something, the way he smiles,” said Lettie. “Oh, Will, get a wiggle on and get us ashore. I’m just about frozen, sitting in all this ice water.”
Although the old dory was logy with water, it was out of the strong current. Will skulled them to the boathouse. Here they found two rusty cans and bailed out the water. Even so, the dory was still heavy from what it had soaked up in its dry boards. They struggled and tugged to get it halfway up to the door.
“Oh, I’m too starved to tug a bit longer,” complained Lettie. “Let’s go get some lunch and come back and finish then.”
The boys agreed to this.
“We’ll tie her up so she won’t drift off if the tide comes up,” said Will.
“After that,” said Jo firmly, “we hunt for shell heaps. I’m counting on them to turn us up something important, something important enough to end Bart’s old bridge before it’s even started.”
CHAPTER FOUR
