(Printed in the United States of America)
FIRE CLOUD;
OR
The Mysterious Cave.
A Story of Indians and Pirates.
Copyright, 1909, by James Sullivan.
All Rights Reserved.
Published by
THE ARTHUR WESTBROOK COMPANY
Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.A.
FIRE CLOUD.
CHAPTER I.
Whether or not, the story which we are about to relate is absolutelytrue in every particular, we are not prepared to say. All we knowabout it is, that old Ben Miller who told it to our uncle Zeph,believed it to be true, as did uncle Zeph himself. And from all we canlearn, uncle Zeph was a man of good judgment, and one not easilyimposed upon.
And uncle Zeph said that he had known old people in his younger days,who stated that they had actually seen the cave where many of thescenes which we are about to relate occurred, although of late years,no traces of any kind could be discovered in the locality where it issupposed to have been situated.
His opinion was, that as great rocks were continually rolling down theside of the mountain at the foot of which the entrance to the cavewas, some one or more of these huge boulders had fallen into theopening and completely closed it up.
But that such a cave did exist, he was perfectly satisfied, and thatit would in all probability be again discovered at some future day, bypersons making excavations in the side of the mountain. And lucky hethought would be the man who should make the discovery, for unheard oftreasures he had no doubt would be found stowed away in the chinks andcrevices of the rocks.
So much by way of introduction; as we have no intention to describethe cave until the proper time comes, we shall leave that part of thesubject for the present, while we introduce the reader to a few of theprincipal personages of our narrative.
At a distance of some fifteen or twenty miles from the City of NewYork, on the Hudson river in the shadow of the rocks known as thePalisades, something near two hundred years ago, lay a small vessel atanchor.
The vessel as we have said was small. Not more than fifty or sixtytons burden, and what would be considered a lumbering craft now a dayswith our improved knowledge of ship building, would at that time becalled a very fast sailor.
This vessel was schooner rigged, and every thing about her deck trimand in good order.
On the forecastle sat two men, evidently sailors, belonging to thevessel.
We say sailors, but in saying so we do not mean to imply that theyresembled your genuine old salt, but something between a sailorand a landsman. They could hardly be called land lubbers, for I doubtif a couple of old salts could have managed their little craft betterthan they, while they, when occasion required, could work on land aswell as water.
In fact they belonged to the class known as river boatmen, though theyhad no hesitation to venturing out to sea on an emergency.
The elder of these men, who might have seen some fifty years or more,was a short, thick set man with dark complexion, and small grey eyesovershadowed by thick, shaggy brows as black as night.
His mouth was large when he chose to open it, but his lips were thinand generally compressed.