“I decided to defeat those fellows, if possible, by getting away from the island without broadcasting an admission that I had been marooned by sophomore hazers.  So I pitched the tent and then constructed an aerial out of material supplied by them and began to broadcast messages of distress, saying that I had been marooned by river thieves who had stolen my boat.  But soon I found that there was someone ‘in the air’ who was determined to defeat this purpose.  It is now 11 p.m., and he seems to have been successful in his attempts to make it appear that I am a faker.  Nobody has offered to come to my rescue.”

Saturday’s entry in the diary opened as follows: 

“Last night, between 2 and 3 a.m., I was awakened by a slight noise outside near the tent.  I stole cautiously to the entrance and peered out.  It was a bright moonlight night and in front of the tent I saw two men apparently examining the camp with much curiosity or evil intent, perhaps both.  Evidently they saw me watching them, for they suddenly turned and fled.  I followed them cautiously and saw them get into a power boat and motor away.  I called to them, explaining my situation and offering to pay them if they would take me away from the island, but they gave me no answer.  Probably they were river thieves and the boat they had was stolen.”

CHAPTER XIV

More Light and More Mystery

The next two days, Saturday and Sunday, were devoted by the island prisoner to the sending out of further calls, for help, and these calls were met by a campaign of ridicule, similar to that begun by his nemesis on the first day of his imprisonment, according to the diary read by Hal to his companions.  A few listeners-in indicated a willingness to come to his rescue, in spite of the plausible ridicule from anonymous source, but when asked where he was imprisoned, ignorance on that subject frustrated all good intentions along that line until his S O S reached Cub at the latter’s home on the following Monday.

“I tried to make this mysterious enemy of mine identify himself,” wrote the diarist under Saturday date; “but he professed to have a wager posted against me which bound us both to secrecy.  This caught me in the solar plexus of my conscience, for I was broadcasting my appeals for help under a false identity.  Two or three amateurs looked me up under the name, call, and address that I gave and then broadcast a denunciation of me.  It begins to look as if my hazers are going to win a full revenge for the way I laughed at them at college.  This day’s experience has convinced me that I am in bad throughout the radio atmosphere.  It begins to look as if I am up against it and will have to stay here the full two weeks to which those hazing kidnappers of mine sentenced one.  I wonder if they will make the term longer because I resorted to the method I have pursued thus far in order to avoid admitting that I had been hazed.  Well, I have this consolation, anyway, that they have to pay for my food as long as I am here.  They had to furnish me a tent also.”