The boys waited until the fire had died down. The four men had all disappeared within the cave.
“Quiet, now,” Frank whispered. He began to make his way out of the undergrowth. Joe followed close behind. They crept up toward the entrance to the cave.
They were about halfway across the open space when the whole scene about them was suddenly revealed with startling clarity in the livid glow of a flash of lightning. This was followed immediately by a crash of thunder that seemed to shake the very rocks on which they stood. As though this were but a prelude, rain began to fall, gently at first, then with increasing force. Other lightning flashes followed. Then the storm broke in all its fury.
A gradually rising wind began to rake the treetops and the swishing of leaves and creaking of limbs could be plainly heard. The dull booming of the waves on the distant shore, the moaning of the wind, the driving spatter of rain, the constant peals of thunder, continually rose in volume, and the rain poured furiously from the black skies above.
The storm had broken so suddenly that the Hardy boys were taken aback. Their first impulse was to race for the shelter of the cave, but second thought told them that this would be unwise, for the men in the cave might be aroused by the storm.
“We’d better go back to the boat,” said Frank, turning about. “It’s liable to be wrecked.”
Joe had almost forgotten about their motorboat. It was on the seaward side of the island and the storm was coming in from the sea. Although the boat was partly protected by the little cove into which they had brought it, there was every danger that the storm might cast the craft up on the rocks and wreck it. The consequences, in that case, would be grave. They would be unable to escape from Blacksnake Island at all without giving themselves up to the gang.
The boys turned and fled back across the rocks. Rain streamed down upon them. Thunder crashed. Lightning flickered, illuminating for brief seconds the tossing trees and the tumbled rocks before them.
Joe, during the afternoon, had occupied himself ascertaining the position of the grove and the cave relative to the little bay in which they had left the motorboat and he had come to the conclusion that the grove was not far away from the end of the island and almost in a direct line with the cove. Now, in their mad race toward the shore, he took the lead, heading toward the rocky bluffs.
The Hardy boys stumbled through the grove, keeping somehow to the trail. They were aided by the lightning flashes that gave spasmodic illumination, revealing the soggy leaves, the black branches, the tossing treetops bowed in the wind.
The storm had become a din of furious sound. The gale shrieked its way across the island from the booming sea and the thunder rolled like a battery of cannon while the rain beat down on the forest in a drumming downpour.
The boys were soaked to the skin. They fled toward the shore, keeping their course more by instinct than judgment, and all the time there was the dread thought in their minds that they were lost if the Sleuth should be cast up on the rocks and wrecked.
XV
A Startling Announcement
The Hardy boys reached the cove in the nick of time. Although the place was protected from the full fury of the sea, the high wind had lashed the waves to such an extent that the boat was pitching and tossing about, in imminent danger of running aground.
The beach was sandy, however, and after some maneuvering, the boys were able to run the boat up on the shore, where it was safe enough. The storm by this time was showing some signs of abating, although the rain was still pouring in undiminished vigor. Frank rummaged about in the boat until he located their oilskins, and these they donned, although their clothes were already drenched.
“I’d hate to be out at sea on a night like this,” shouted Frank, as the lightning revealed the tossing inferno of waves under the black skies.
At that moment a light flashed away out to the right.
“A boat!” exclaimed Joe.
“Heading toward the island!”
They kept their eyes fixed on the place where they had seen the light. In a few moments a vivid splash of lightning cut the darkness and they had a momentary glimpse of a small motorboat tossing about in the black waves.
“He’ll never make the shore in this storm,” said Frank, shaking his head.
“Can it be Tony?”
“I hardly think so. He wouldn’t come close in such a storm.”
“That’s true, too.”
“I think it’s some outsider.”
“Do you think we can help him?”
“I don’t think so. He’ll probably pile up on the rocks.”
“Perhaps he’s one of the gang.”
“That’s so,” agreed Frank. “I hadn’t thought of that. Perhaps he knows where he’s going, after all. Still, it won’t hurt to go down the shore a bit and see if he makes his landing all right.”
They went on down the shore in the darkness, picking their way among the rocks, feeling in their faces the salt spray blown in from the sea. The dull booming of the surf and the howling of the wind provided an almost deafening cacophony of sound. Every little while, a lightning flash would reveal the little boat, slowly heading in toward the shore.
Suddenly Frank stopped short, grasping his brother by the arm.
“I saw a light ahead.”
“I thought I did too. Right on the shore.”
They waited. In a moment the light reappeared. It bobbed slowly up and down and appeared to be moving down toward the beach.
“Somebody is going down to meet the boat. It must be one of the gang,” declared Frank.
The boys went forward more cautiously. The next flash of lightning showed that Frank’s assumption was correct. They could
