The Rival Campers; Or, The Adventures of Henry BurnsSmith, Ruel Perley
General
The Rival Campers; Or, The Adventures of Henry Burns
Smith, Ruel Perley
Boats and boating -- Juvenile fiction; Camping -- Juvenile fiction
“He’s in a tearing rush to get away, sure enough,” muttered Harvey. “Now
he is getting up the anchor, and slatting it up in lively style, too. But
he is a stronger man than I am, there’s no mistake about that,” and
Harvey felt of two lumps on his head that bore witness to the man’s
violence.
“If I only had Joe Hinman and Allan Harding here now he wouldn’t sail
away so easily. But that’s neither here nor there. I’ll know that elegant
hull, however, and I’ll know that slick-setting suit of sails anywhere in
all this bay, and I’ll get even with him yet. The _Surprise_ couldn’t
catch that boat in a race in a hundred years, but I’ll catch him napping
somewhere between here and Portland, or I have sailed this bay for
nothing.”
The yacht, its sails filling to the light morning airs, sailed slowly out
from its place of hiding and faded away into the darkness.
Jack Harvey, waiting a moment longer to rest, started off on an easy
jog-trot back to camp. “For,” said he to himself, “the _Surprise_ must up
anchor and after that fellow before daylight. We’ll catch him first, and
then find out what he has been up to. Perhaps he is another—
“Why, by Jove!” exclaimed Harvey, suddenly, “what a fool I am! How could
I ever have forgotten for a moment where I saw that face once before? The
man in the rowboat! Whoop! And that yacht is the _Eagle_, as sure as my
name is Harvey. And that man is Chambers. And to think I came across the
bay with him, alone at night!”
The cold drops of perspiration stood out on Harvey’s forehead at the very
thought of it.
Over hills and through woods ran Harvey, his arms pressed close to his
sides and his head down. He had gone about a mile in this way when, upon
emerging from a dense clump of bushes and ascending at the same time a
little hill, he paused to survey the prospect ahead.
The sight that met his eyes astounded him. Up against the black morning
sky there streamed a broad flaring of red, irregular and uncertain. Now
it streamed up in a widely diffused glare. Again it darted up in a series
of sharp streaks of red.
“Heavens!” cried Harvey. “It’s the hotel and it’s all on fire! Now I know
it’s Chambers, for certain. Now I know why he struck me down. Now I know
what we’ll hunt him for and what we’ll catch him for.”
Harvey, redoubling his speed, raced for his camp.
While this strange chase of Harvey after the man had been going on, even
more exciting things had been happening at the hotel.
Shortly before the time the man had run into Harvey in the pasture and
knocked him down, the boys had finished an absorbing game of billiards,
had put cues and balls carefully away, extinguished the lights, and left
the hotel.
They were in high spirits at their harmless adventure, as they walked a
short distance together, and then separated.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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